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The senorita atones for a multitude of sins. 



ALONG THE 
RIO GRANDE 



BY 

TRACY HAMMOND LEWIS 



Illustrations by 

OSCAR FREDERICK HOWARD 



NEW YORK 

LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 

1916 






Copyright, 1916, by 
The Lewis Publishing Comrany 



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DEC -9 1916 



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This Book 

Is Dedicated to 

WILLIAM EUGENE LEWIS 

Tlie Best Father 

Have Ever Had 

T. H. L. 



PREFACE 

To gather material for this book the author wan- 
dered in July and August, 1916, along the Rio Grande 
as a warless war correspondent. Disappointed in the 
absence of sanguinary battles, he turned his attention to 
the less bloodthirsty inhabitants and the country in which 
they lived, and felt it had been worth the journey. 

What he has said concerning them was written 
hastily from day to day for the New York Morning Tele- 
graph, to which he is indebted for the permission to 
reprint it. 

He does not offer this book for literary merits, nor 
has he any "message" to convey. For this he apologizes. 
He has described conditions only as he found them and 
persons whom he has met, without coloring to suit a 
purpose. 

If he conveys to the reader a small part of the inter- 
est and strangeness of the land by the Rio Grande his 
mission shall have been fulfilled — the ''message" can be 
reserved for some distant date. 

T. H. L. 



CONTENTS. 

Chapter Page 
I. On the Way to the Border and the Unex- 
pectedness of El Paso 1 

II. In Old Juarez 8 

III. El Paso Loves the Military — Refugees 

from Sonora 1 5 

IV. Miners and Bandits and Weather Phe- 

nomena 24 

V. Private Perry and the Scars Which Are His 
Memoranda — Concerning T'ranters and 

Sichlike 31 

VI. The Hermit of El Paso 41 

VII. Hopping Up to Cloudcroft 47 

VIII. Our ''Starving Army" and Baking on the 

Border 53 

IX. The Lost Mine of Tayopa 62 

X. Marianna Culmanero, Heap Big Indian 

Chief 67 

XI. Bathing and Other Sports in Ysleta 74 

XII. Justice Along the Rio Grande 79 

XIII. Forty Years Too Late 85 

XIV. Douglas, Another Port of Entry to Mexico 91 
XV. Bisbee, the Hidden City 101 



Contents 

Chapter Page 

XVI. Down in Bisbee's Stomach 107 

XVII. Nogales, on Both Sides of the Line 113 

XVIII. A Trip Into Zapata Land 122 

XIX. How Lower California Nearly "Annexed" 

the United States 128 

XX. More of Jack Noonan 135 

XXI. The Man Who Knew Mexico Well 144 

XXII. Will the Militia Survive? 149 

XXIII. The Silent (?) Drama at McAllen 153 

XXIV. The Border Y. M. C. A 158 

XXV. Why the Army's Like a Serpent 163 

XXVI. Little Brown Muchachos 170 

XXVII. Getting the Range of the Texas Ranger . . 176 

XXVIII. The Lady of the Army 183 

XXIX. The Songs of the Seventh 189 

XXX. Both Sides of the Army Pill 194 

XXXI. Baking on the Border 200 

XXXII. A Soldier of Fortune With Villa 204 

XXXIII. The Mexican Army 211 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Facing Page 
The senorita atones for a multitude of sins . Frontispiece 

All that one now sees are the lowest class of Mexi- 
cans and idling Carranza soldiers 10 

A "starving" mihtiaman on the border 54 

She appeared quite indifferent as to whether she got 

the money or not 70 ^ 

Some stopped and stared at us 1 1 8 "^ 

"We didn't come down here to be a first hne of 

defense" l5o ^ 

'They got us down here so we couldn't vote" 166 

For once he was unconscious of the admiring group 

of seven that followed him down the street. . . 172^ 

Looming above the horizon 176 

/ 
It is not difficult to distinguish a Ranger 180 

"The whole medical department is a bunch of pills" 196 "" 



CHAPTER I. 

On the Way to the Border and the Unexpectedness of 

El Paso. 

It wasn't until I reached Texarkana — a town which 
being not completely in Texas nor Arkansas is not fish 
nor is it fowl — that I realized, perhaps in addition to re- 
porting any news made by Messrs. Villa and Carranza, 
there might, after all, be a further and definite mission 
in my trip to the border. 

I fix Texarkana as the place where I first saw 
light because it isn't until a long way from St. Louis 
that one finds a noticeable change in the country, and 
during the deep watches of the night I had slept as no one 
in a far country on a train hurdling countless switches has 
a right to sleep. 

My mission, to make a long story longer, is to correct 
the misinterpretation under which the South has been 
suffering since the Civil War first brought it to the atten- 
tion of its Northern brethren. 

There are three things that make the South different 
from any other place — cotton, coons and caloric, and con- 
cerning them gross misrepresentations have been made to 
the people of such parts of the country where ice isn't 
jewelry. 

It is astonishing how much one can learn of a race 
by observing it from a train window. I feel now as if I 
thoroughly understand the Southern colored people. With 



% Along the Rio Grande 

the knowledge I have become convinced that they are not 
as I had been led to believe — lazy, shiftless and thought- 
less. 

Negfroes are divided into two classes, those standing 
and those sitting down. In Texas latitude 1 do not be- 
lieve the v/alkin? negro exists. But standing or sitting 
they show a perseverence, tirelessness and a tender- 
heartedness that their pale-faced brother (who isn't very 
pale down here) might do well to imitate. 

No work is too absorbing for them to drop when a 
train rushes by. This is due partly to their desire to 
obtain the wholesome exercise of waving and partly be- 
cause their kindheartedness forbids them to allow the 
traveller to speed onward toward God knows what with- 
out some little thin^ to lighten his way. 

Naturally, with the number of trains that pass every 
day, this task of waving to all of them is no simple 
one and the Texas negro (no Texan would know him by 
that name) has reduced the operation to one of the great- 
est efficiency (another quality with which he has seldom 
been justly accredited). As the train approaches his arm 
is raised slowly in front. As the train roars past 
a slight quivering, like that of an aspen leaf, affects 
the hand. This continues until the train is well by. His 
arm again sinks back to its normal position and then, 
with the v/onderful imagination which I find a character- 
istic of the colored workers, he stands motionless, watch- 
ing the train out of sight, woniering what its destination 
may be, what awaits the innocent travellers within and 
whether God will ever be kind enoue"h to allow it to return 
past the field in which he is working. With a sigh 
he turns back to his task, and if he seems to be less 



. * On the Way to the Border 3 

industrious than he should it is not because of any laziness 
on his part. 

Again it is due to his kindheartedness. He fears if 
he sets too hard a pace his comrades will follow his ex- 
ample. He fears also their strength is not equal to his 
and the thought makes him slow and cautious. 

The other class, the sitting negro, is seen usually 
in his hut, which is perfectly oblong, unpainted, and has 
on it somewhere or other a porch. The sitting negro is 
the dreamer, the planner of his community. He gives 
scant consideration to himself, but sits there, sits there 
forever wondering how he can be of benefit to his fellow- 
men, wonderino^ how he is going to obtain a college 
education for those six pickanninies you see sprawled out 
on the steps. At times it might seem that his black head, 
which is bowed forward on the white undershirt, that 
with a pair of blue overalls complete his attire, is lost in 
slumber, but those who really understand him know it is 
merely the intensity of his thought that gives this appear- 
ance. 

My discoveries about the heat and cotton were made 
at almost the same time. On my way to the smoking 
room I noticed that the thermometer stood at 96 degrees. 
I thought no more about it until, after I had taken my 
seat, a leathery-faced individual attached to an enormous 
brown cigar bent a challenging look upon me and said: 

"Rather warm, humh?" 

I thought it best not to argue about a little matter 
like 96 decrees. But the heat is not oppressive. Unless 
one breathes it into his lungs, a process which is apt to 
scorch them, and thereby heat up his blood, he will not 
feel the effect of the increased temperature in the least. 



'4 Along the Rio Grande 

I must admit, however, that it gives one a rather queer 
feeling to see some pond, which has reached the boiling 
point, steaming away out in the cool green fields. 

The heat results in one being able to procure hot 
water in the trains from the tap labelled ''hot," but the 
pleasure which one obtains from this source is somewhat 
moderated by the fact that hot water flows with equal 
celerity from the one with "cold" written thereon. 

As I looked out of the smoker window I saw an end- 
less rolling hill of young plants. 

"Some potato field," I remarked to my hot weather 
friend, for I was impressed by the extent of the acreage. 

"Them ain't potatoes, they's cotton," he answered 
more severely than I thought necessary. 

Then I knew what a tremendous imposition is being 
practiced on the Northern States. That green potatoey 
looking stuff was no more the soft white material that we 
call cotton than an Alabama chipmunk is like a Pome- 
ranian. For some mysterious reason the South has been 
deceiving us, and before I turn northward again I intend 
to learn the reason. 

El Paso is quite as surprising a proposition as one 
would wish to find. One would expect after riding 
through hundreds of miles of sun-scorched cactus, mes- 
quite and rocks, with small quantities of alkali dust scat- 
tered sparingly between, to come upon a city in which 
there lived only those who were blind, halt or without 
interest in life and what it offered. 

The train window gives little hint of the produc- 
tivity that the land contiguous to El Paso really contains. 
With little exception all in sight is the stretch of barren 
hills on the other side of the Rio Grande in Mexico with 



On the Way to the Border 5 

the equally barren Davis range on the north. Occasion- 
ally one sees herds of cattle, with a few horses thrown in 
to keep them company, roaming along in a thin, aimless 
fashion. They seem to be continually searching for some- 
thing, which something is doubtless water or a bite to eat, 
for in most of the places, it requires forty acres of land 
apiece to furnish them nourishment, and the water is few 
and far between. 

A bridge is crossed and near it are the tents of the 
soldiers doing guard duty, and if the trains are going 
slowly enough, which is usually the case, they yell to have 
newspapers thrown oflf to them. For a few minutes the 
air is filled with fluttering white. 

Farther away, among the green of the mesquite 
along the Rio Grande, which is a few miles distant from 
the tracks, brown tents can just be distinguished from 
time to time. 

It doesn't take many miles of this sort of country to 
cause one to be startled when the factories, smelters and 
other buildings burst out from the plains just outside of 
El Paso. The shock is made somewhat greater when one 
actually finds himself in the middle of a city after leaving 
the train. Seven-story buildings are common enough, so 
an EI Pasoan can almost look indifferent when he points 
them out. 

Its population is 70,000. I had this astonishing 
bit of information thrown at my receptive head by a taxi 
driver, who, after surveying me with a critical air, charged 
me in payment for his information fifty cents for a ride 
which, I was later told should have been "two bits." I 
was advised that if I wished I could consider its numbers 
80,000, for with its immediately adjacent suburbs, such 



6 Along the Rio Grande 

as Fort Bliss, it reaches this total. However, I didn't care 
to do so, for somehow or other I had a feeling that it 
would be expensive. 

By judicious inquiry I ascertained that the people 
who have settled in this place are for the most part, in 
spite of my previous fears, in full possession of their 
senses and could go to other places if they cared to do so. 
I did not glean this from any of the hackmen. El Paso 
is the commercial, mining and agricultural center of this 
part of Texas. Long years ago, before even the ex- 
tremely ancient men who are one of the features of 
hotel life here, were attacking the slats on their cradles, 
the Apache Indians, with their excellent method of regu- 
lating their household affairs, set their wives to cultivating 
land, then rich and fertile. 

Along about 1840, unless some one has been lying 
to me, white men began to outnumber the Indians and 
suggest that they move elsewhere. 

Several years after this lumbermen, by clearing oflf 
the timber along the Rio Grande in New Mexico and 
Arizona, caused El Paso to suffer from droughts and 
floods, according to season, with a resultant damage to 
farming conditions. This has all been remedied by a tre- 
mendous dam, the Elephant Butte, recently built. 
Through the irrigation this makes possible 188,000 acres 
of land have been reclaimed, 48,000 of which lie in 
Texas. 

Near El Paso are raised large quantities of cattle, 
alfalfa, grain and other crops. 

Just at present — July, 1916 — the streets are filled 
with soldiers and "greasers," the native white population 
sinking into insignificance beside the striking appearance 



On the Way to the Border 7 

of the former. When the rest of the National Guard, 
now on its way, reaches El Paso there will be 75,000 
troops encamped in its vicinity, and, without including the 
large numbers of Mexicans who have taken refuge there 
to escape the enthusiasms of their kind, there are 20,000 
"greasers" infesting the streets at one time or another. 

There is the fear constantly stored away in the 
back of the El Pasoan mind that these Mexicans will 
take it into their heads to have a specially-appointed 
uprising at the expense of the Americans who happen to 
be in the city at the time. To guard against this there 
are squads of soldiers constantly doing guard duty, and, 
although such an uprising might result in the loss of a 
great many lives, it would not require much time to sup- 
press it. Not long ago, when a large fire broke out there, 
300 men came from Camp Cotton on their military 
motorcycles in seven minutes. It is a distance of about 
three miles. The armed presence of so many "los grin- 
gos" has got the Mexicans pretty well subdued, and it is 
not very probable, unless they get a lot of bad whisky 
packed away beneath their belts or some of their brethren 
from across the river sally forth in a raid, that they will 
attempt any uprising. 

There are many American refugees in town, most 
of them being in the mining business, but, aside from 
this, there is very little of what the hotel man calls "tran- 
sient trade," and business is not as good as it usually is 
at this time of year, and all possible attempts are being 
made by the citizenry to make the honest soldier recom- 
pense them for the misfortune which near war has brought 
upon El Paso. Families of the militia in particular will 
doubtless soon be hearing loud cries for additional funds. 



CHAPTER II. 
In Old Juarez. 

Like a trip to Chinatown to the round-eyed visitor 
who wishes to "see New York," a journey across the Rio 
Grande into the Mexican border town of Juarez affords 
the g:reatest amount of excitement to him who seeks thrills 
in the town of El Paso. 

Since the recently strained relations with Mexico all 
Americans have been requested to leave the city. All 
that one now sees over there are the sullen brown faces 
of the Mexicans, the large majority of whom are peons. 
American Consular Agent Edwards himself has departed 
and is making his headquarters at El Paso. 

I went over upon my arrival in El Paso with J. Y. 
Baskin, a commission merchant who has large interests 
in Mexico and makes the trip across the river daily. He 
is rather skeptical of the amount of danger involved. 

"If a person keeps cober and minds his own business 
there is no reason at all why he should have any trouble 
with the Mexicans. Farther in it might be different, but 
in Juarez a drunken native and possible arrest are the chief 
things to avoid." 

We drove out in a machine along South Santa Fe 
street, which rapidly changes in character from the low 
business buildings near El Paso to the adobe houses of the 
peons, almost the only persons to be found in that part of 
town, which is known as the Chihuahua District. The 
bridge leading over the Rio Grande to the Mexican town 

8 



■ In Old Juarez 9 

is reached and on the American side are groups of militia, 
part of whom are acting as a patrol and the rest there 
merely from a desire to look across at the "greasers" on 
the other side and dream of a battle with them, which is 
far too slow, in their eyes, in coming. 

Our car was stopped and the guards searched under 
the seats to make sure that nothing illegal was taken to 
the other side. At the farther end of the bridge we halted 
again to obtain permission from the Mexican patrol to 
proceed into the city. 

It is hard to adjust oneself at first to the sudden 
jump from the busy, noisy, prosperous El Paso to the 
sleepy, penniless city of starving peons. It has changed 
from the riotous town of gambhng and vice that it was 
a few years ago. All that one now sees in the streets are 
the lowest class of Mexicans and hundreds of idling Car- 
ranza soldiers who are glad of the opportunity to fight and 
take their chance of being killed in return for food and 
Carranza money, even though the latter is practically 
worthless, except in payment for express, railroad fare 
and telegraph tolls. 

The Silver King, the Cafe Negro, the Big Kid, the 
Tivoli, the Mexican Monte Carlo and the Black Cat Dance 
Hall, which Jack London described as the most depraved 
in the country, are no longer the scenes of activity that 
they were when Villa tucked away in his jeans ^80,000 
monthly from the vice concessions. In those good old 
days that ingenious bandit added to his income by slap- 
ping on a revenue tax on all liquor except that which he 
had freighted over the river at night. 

A murder was a small matter in the Black Cat. An 
El Pasoan recalls one night there when two stabbings took 



10 'Along the Rio Grande 

place. The victims were carried out to the street and the 
dancing never stopped. 

Even when times were less troubled than at present 
Juarez frequently proved a trifle too exciting for 
American citizens. A party of newspaper men from this 
city were once sitting in the Cafe Negro peacefully sipping 
their drinks. At a table across the room was a big, 
swarthy Mexican with two senoritas. A note was handed 
to one of the women and instantly the Mexican snatched 
it away and demanded who sent it. She nodded toward 
the door, which happened to be in the direction of the 
journalists, though all had easy consciences. The Mex- 
ican singled out one of the group as the guilty party and 
the first inkling the latter had of the excitement created 
was the blurred vision of a vase hurtling by his head pro- 
pelled by the senorita's champion. Happily his aim 
was as bad as his intentions. The Mexican quickly fol- 
lowed the vase and in a couple of seconds was standmg 
over the American with a gun pressed tightly against his 
victim's stomach, demanding an explanation. 

"It was the longest three minutes I ever had," said 
the newspaper man in speaking about it to me. "I had 
my doubts whether I would be able to convince him that 
my actions had been perfectly innocent. 

"On another occasion we stepped into the entrance 
to one of the places and stumbled over a sleeping guard. 

**'Carajo! Quien vive!' he cried and sank on one 
knee, raising his rifle. My friend gasped. 'My God,' he 
cried with the clearness of vision that frequently comes to 
one who has had as much to drink as he had, 'when they 
drop on one knee like that they mean to shoot.* He was 
probably right, but at that moment an officer fortunately 




All one now sees are the lowest class of Mexicans and 
idling Carransa soldiers. 



In Old Juarez 11 

came running up and gave the order to cease firing. We 
hurried back to El Paso where we belonged." 

The inside of the custom house is decorated with 
pictures of Mexican notables. Each new faction in power 
tears down those of the persons of whom they do not 
approve and substitutes for them their own pet idols. 

The old bull ring has been burned, although fights 
can still be held in it. It was fired when the Maderistas 
took the town in 1911 and the industrious IWexicans in 
the intervening five years have been unable to assemble 
either enough energy or money to rebuild it. The ruins 
are still standing of Kettleson & Degetau's wholesale 
hardware house, the railroad station, the custom house 
and the post office building which were fired in the same 
year. Most of the other places have been patched up or 
completely torn down. 

Throughout all the trouble that the place has seen, 
the impressive white cement Mission Guadalupe, which 
is flanked by squatty Mexican places of business, and the 
big Juarez racetrack have remained untouched, the former 
probably because of superstition, and the latter through 
a healthy respect of the Mexican for the $100,000 a year 
paid for the racing concession and the resultant crowds 
which it has brought in the past. 

Although I was unable to go inside of it I am told 
thai the interior of the cathedral is unique. The primitive 
mind of the Mexican being unable to conceive of Christ 
in any but a material way have a score or more realistic 
wax figures of Him that are revolting in their vividness. 
Some depict Him in a coffin, others with blood dripping 
from wounds — all of them offensive to those accustomed 
to milder methods of representation. 



12 'Along the Rio Grande 

Several long-necked chickens, lean from nervousness 
caused by thieving: neighbors, scurried away from in front 
of us, complaining: at the hardness of fate. Some optimis- 
lic Mexican had planted a small patch of corn on one of 
the streets. How much his hune:ry friends will leave for 
him when it is ready for picking is problematical. 

House after house of adobe and a few of brick we 
passed. Peeking out at the Grins:os from the doors, or 
running around barefooted or naked in front of them 
were swarms of muchachos — the Mexican family has 
much in common with the rabbit. 

In one yard we saw a rare sight, a woman with the 
inevitable black shawl over her head, giving her little 
brown nino a bath. The sad part of it was the baby was 
too young ever to recall the event. A little further along, 
on the banks of the irrigation canal, a few hardy youths 
of twelve were stripped for a swim. Bathing suits are not 
a civic requirement. 

A few hopeful street vendors, whom none seemed to 
favor with a great deal of attention, strolled up the street. 
One with a basket of cakes was telling those who cared to 
listen: "Oh, que bueno, lo que traigo ahora." ("Get 
next to the good stuff I've got with me to-day.") An old 
man with a black beard on one half of his chin, a few 
teeth, a red shirt and wearing sandals, hovered anxiously 
over a haphazard goat. In a voice that once mighi have 
been musical he cried: "Fresco leche." If you or I had 
been doing it we would have said: "Fresh milk," and 
meant about the same thing. The worthy Juarez citizen 
has the goat milked before his eyes and is sure that he is 
getting it new. 

Juarez is conveniently located for the residents of 



In Old Juarea 18 

El Paso who wish to watch the battles which are not as 
uncommon as they should be over there. A. F. Haynes, 
a railroad man of this city, described to me the fight when 
Maedro's forces took Juarez from those of Diaz in l9ll. 

"1 was up in the tower of the El Paso station when 
they began to fire," he said. "I could see the puffs of 
smoke and hear the faint cracks from the rifles of Ma- 
dero's men, led by Generals Orosco and Blanco. At the 
time Madero himself was stopping at the Sheldon Hotel, 
in this city, when word was brought to him of the engage- 
ment. He jumped into a big red automobile and dashed 
up Santa Fe street far up the river, where he crossed over. 
He wished his men to surrender, and he sent a bearer with 
a flag of truce on a snow-white horb>e. 

"He rode toward the line of Maderistas. Through 
the glasses I saw one of the men rise up. There was a 
spurt of smoke and the rider dropped from his horse. His 
assassin didn't wish the forces he v/as with to surrender 
at this time. The rest of the troops, thinking the flag bear- 
er had been shot by some one on the other side, were furi- 
ous and went on with the attack more frenziedly than 
ever. The city was taken later. 

"The next year Villa captured the town with a single 
cannon shot, after which the white flag was run up at 
Juarez and the place surrendered. It was following this 
that Villa held the executions which shocked the United 
States so much. Ammunition was scarce. To save it he 
lined his prisoners up seven deep in front of the wall and 
turned the machine guns on them." 

Everywhere we went we saw evidences of the con- 
stant state of war in which the country of Mexico exists. 
Cavalrymen, all Carranzistas, some with new suits and 



14 Along the Rio Gramde 

some with nothing but their usual flannel shirts, chaps and 
sombreros, rode up the street on horses that had doubtless 
been stolen. We passed places of business, with armed 
Mexicans sitting on the steps outside, and through numer- 
ous doors piles of guns could be seen within. 

It is quite doubtful, unless the situation clears greatly 
the coming months, whether Juarez will be restored to its 
usual gay activity. The track will probably remain closed. 
Tourists will not dare nor be permitted to visit there un- 
less some sort of order is brought about in Mexico, which 
at present seems extremely doubtful. Without racing and 
the tourists the other places will remain closed and 
Juarez will remain the same sleepy, famine-ridden, op- 
pressed city it now is. 



CHAPTER III. 
El Paso Loves the Military — Refugees From Sonora. 

Men in number sufficiently great to wipe out the 
entire Mexican army, should the gentlemen decide to 
advance on this city in a body, are stationed at or near 
El Paso. In July there were more than 28,000 soldiers 
from the States of Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode 
Island and Michigan, with enough more expected to raise 
the number to 50,000. In no matter what direction one 
travels from the city, whether it is to Camps Pershing, 
Stewart, Cotton and Fort Bliss or along the border, 
their yellow khaki tents are bunched in all parts of the 
landscape. 

El Paso rejoices, for a soldier's money — when he 
has it — is noted for its inability to stay in his pocket. The 
town for many years has been prosperous, but it has now 
reached the ultra-wealthy stage. It is catching the 
shekels as they fall. There is every evidence that it will 
be many months before the troops are recalled, since 
the chances for any conflict with Mexico seem extremely 
remote, though the danger constantly threatens. 

The only thing that up to the time I visited there 
in July had thrown a hint of shadow into the situation 
was the fact that many of the militia had run out of 
funds. El Paso is a city of extremely high prices — one 
that would make New York blush for its amateurish- 
ness. Many of the State militia had not yet received 
their pay. The First ^Pennsylvania Brigade, for instance, 

15 



16 Along the Rio Grande 

did not draw any recompense until July 19, which was 
for the latter part of June only. 

However, in spite of this, El Paso is doing very 
well and a large number of the visitors in town are those 
who have heard of the good news and have come to 
take advantage of their opportunities. 

Camps Cotton, Pershing and Fort Bliss are situated 
near the lines which run into town. The cars are jammed 
at all hours of the day with soldiers coming to the city. 
Those at Camp Stewart — the Fourth, Eighth and Sixth 
Pennsylvania Infantry and the First Pennsylvania Cav- 
alry — are not so fortunate, as their location is eight miles 
from El Paso, with no trolley at hand. It means a long, 
hot hike for them through the alkali dust or an occasional 
lift from one of their trucks, for which no bodies have 
yet been received. 

At every corner a fakir of some sort awaits their 
arrival. "Impromptu" auction sales are held on the 
street. Some "rancher" who has suddenly discovered a 
pressing need for funds is willing to sacrifice several 
precious rings which he happens to have with him, for 
whatever they will bring. The unfortunate man sells 
them, too, but before he puts up the next ring with the 
little white stone in it, v/hich volunteer experts pronounce 
a flawless diamond, he thoroughly impresses it upon the 
purchaser he has practically committed a robbery by not 
having paid more. 

If gold at panic rates fails to lure the militiaman 
he can go a little further down Mills street to purchase 
from a "first cousin of Villa" a handsomely burnished 
set of horns which, when lung power is applied to one 
extremity, will emit a low, moaning noise calculate4 to 



El Paso Loves the Military 17 

conjure before the eyes of the people back home a vivid 
picture of the bold, bad West in which their son has been 
camping. 

The seven motion picture shows are "turning them 
away," both in the daytime and at night, for, in spite 
of the heat, the picture proprietors manage to keep their 
theatres cool. 

In their wildest dreams the saloons foresaw no such 
days as these, although it is seldom that one finds a 
drunken soldier on the streets. El Paso is not dry — far 
from it — except after 9.30 at night and on Sunday. If 
an overpowering desire for demon rum still attacks one 
at these times it does not require an unusual degree of 
ingenuity to obtain it. It is possible, for a nominal sum, 
to join any one of several drinking clubs such as 'The 
Cactus" or "The Wigwam" and quench your thirst as 
thoroughly as your bankroll will permit. 

The hotels and restaurants are filled at every meal 
with Uncle Sam's boys in khaki. Most of them are either 
officers or militiamen, for the regular, as a general rule, 
has no outside allowance upon which to draw. The 
army pay without artificial aid will not permit of a too 
excessively pampered life, a fact which does not entirely 
abolish the rivalry existing between the two branches of 
the service. 

El Paso, as it is about 4,000 feet up in the air and 
has a dry climate, is an excellent place for consumptives. 
As a result one does not meet the type of New York 
panhandler who tells you he only needs ten cents more 
to have enough carfare to leave the city. Instead he 
appeals to one's sympathies by saying that he is a lunger 
and unable to work. 



18 Along the Rio Grande 

At some stands more than 2,000 postal cards 
depicting all the gruesomeness of the Mexican atrocities 
(few others are popular) are sold a day, and one of 
the local dealers was recently seen pricing automobiles 
in a salesroom. The photograph which has proved the 
favorite is one showing a Villa victim just dropping 
after having been riddled by the bullets of the firing squad. 
Doubtless half of the squad missed their man, but if one 
looks closely (the picture is very clear) one can plainly 
see the bloody effect of several of the missiles. Another 
equalling it is one of the Santa Ysabel victims. Many 
Eastern families who have heretofore been in doubt about 
the safety of their boys at the border will be greatly 
cheered by the receipt of the photographs. 

"Dan," the proprietor of a shooting gallery, has 
been taking in $30 a day, as opposed to $\S when his 
place was on a peace footing. He has lived in El Paso, 
he told me, for eleven years, but has never been beyond 
San Antonio street, about five blocks from his establish- 
ment. 

I laid down the rifle at his range after six shots that 
would have convinced any one that the Mexican bandits 
had nothing to fear from me. He evidently was under 
the impression that after the exhibition I had made I 
would be wishing to leave hurriedly, and it did not suit 
his purpose. He had news of great importance. It was 
necessary that he confide in some one. 

"Say," he said, "I have been working in this 



* * place for eleven years. After I get 

through working some more in a photograph studio — 
sixteen hours a day all told, 1 go to bed. I've been 
makin' pretty good money these last six weeks and in 



^ ' El Paso Loves the Military 19 

a few more months I take a vacation. Tm going to leave 
this city and stay a year." 

He then went into details of what he would 
do on his vacation. The neighboring towns will shortly 
receive an object lesson in how a spender and his 
money are separated, and Dan will no longer be able to 
boast of San Antonio street as the boundary line of his 
circulation. 

Several Mexicans have been making $10 a day oi 
more selling puppies, which are bought for company mas- 
cots. A slis:ht idea of the magnitude of these transactions 
can be obtained when one reflects that in the native cur- 
rency of these gentlemen, this means about $50,000 a 
day. Then, too, there are Mexican fleas (they have an 
unlimited supply on which to work), completely clothed 
by Mexican convicts unable to clothe themselves; like- 
wise the Indian blankets, trinkets and silverware manu- 
factured in Boston, which can be had for the equivalent of 
a song (sung by Caruso or some other high priced artist) . 

All these things considered, it were better that the 
remittances come in a little faster. 

Nine American refugees who had been stopping in 
El Paso until it was feasible for them to return to their 
work in Cananea received word on July 16 from the com- 
panies by which they are employed to report back in that 
city. They started for Naco the following night, from 
which point they were to cross the border about thirty 
miles into the State of Sonora, in which Cananea is lo- 
cated. Those who returned were A. C. Henry, J. K. 
Griffith, E. Jackson, A. Thomas Wearing, J. A. Ramsey, 
R. L. Thompson, Charles Townsend and Jim Newton, all 
in the mining business. 



20 Alojig the Rio Grande 

It was onlv three weeks before that hundreds from 
Bliss, Douglas and neighboring: towns were crowded about 
the Naco railroad station awaiting the arrival of these per- 
sons, half of whom were believed to have been massacred 
by the Mexicans. The train bearins; them from. Cananea 
was four hours late, and the fear that they had been mur- 
dered en route grew in the minds of those who were ex- 
pecting them. 

Nearly a thousand men had pledged themselves to 
g:o in armed and get them if they failed to come. Those 
who could not be carried by the hundred autos provided 
for the expedition intended to go on foot, but they would 
only have returned with the dead bodies if there had been 
any treachery on the part of the Mexicans. 

I spoke with one of the men who had been on this 
train, but he did not wish his name used in connection with 
the story, as the Mexicans maintain a bureau in Washing- 
ton which sends to all parts of their country clippings of 
gny comments made. If an American criticizes Mexico 
or its people he is "thirty-threed" — that is, he is told 
that his presence is no longer desired by that nation, and 
he will never be allowed to return. This is provided for 
by Article 33 in the Mexican Constitution, which 
says any undesirable foreigner may be exiled. For 
those who have built up their business there, it is a 
serious matter. 

*Three weeks ago," said the refugee with whom I 
was speaking, "everything was comparatively quiet, if 
Mexico can ever be called quiet, until word was received 
by the Jefe Politico, the Mayor of Cananea, of Wilson's 
note to Carranza. A telegram to the Jefe followed in 
which it was said: 'It is your duty as true Mexican citizens 



Ei Paso Loves the Military 21 

to arm and repel this invasion.' Immediately the town 
was like a beehive. 

"The dispatch was read in a motion picture theatre, 
in which I happened to be at the time, and the dance hall. 
All Americans v/ere told to go to their homes and the 
IVlexicans were commanded to go to the Municipal Palace, 
where they would receive rifles. In an hour, in addition 
to the re,s:ular garrison, 3,000 men were in arms. 

"On the streets the men could be heard crying, 
'Mueran los gringoes' — 'kill the Americans'— and it 
needed but a spark to set off the powder. 

"That night twelve men, unable to obtain convey- 
ances of any sort, and leaving all of their baggage behind, 
hiked for the border and fortunately got there in safety. 
One of the men carried an 8-year-old boy all the way. 
On the other side it was said that the youngster had been 
killed. 

"One auto containing women tried to leave. It was 
fired on by the guards. The motor was turned back and 
the fugitives forced to return to their homes. 

"The next day the excitement died. Several ob- 
tained machines and left in safety, but on the following 
day the agitation was renewed. Americans there were 
under the impression war had been declared, that Pershing 
and Trevino had been in a big engagement and El Paso 
had been fired on by Juarez and the capture of the latter 
had followed. 

"All the Americans were told by the American con- 
sular agent to leave immediately. General Plutarco Calles 
announced that an armed train had been provided for the 
transportation of all of the Americans the next day at 2 
o'clock and that they must go. He also sent word to the 



22 'Along the Rio Grande 

Jefe Politico of Cananea that the people must be allowed 
to depart unharmed. 

'The actions of the natives were fierce and sullen. 
Relations were strained almost to the breaking point. You 
can imagine our feelings when an Englishman at the hotel 
there 'sicked' his dog on a Mexican cur out in the street 
and the two began to fight. An armed guard in a rage 
raised his gun to shoot, but fortunately the dogs stopped 
and the gun was again lowered. A smaller thing than this 
might have meant the death of all of us, however, and 
the language in which we addressed the pompous Britisher 
was colored accordingly. 

"I had been warned privately by the nephew of Gov- 
ernor Calles not to take the train. He feared that those 
in it would never reach the border alive. There was no 
other way out, and so with the rest I piled in it the fol- 
lowing day at 2. My fears were increased when I saw 
that all the women had been placed in a separate car, in 
which the men were not allowed to enter. In Mexico 
that is apt to mean only one thing, but it was too late 
for any of us to adopt other plans. 

"It seemed years before we reached Naco. When 
we did the people all stared at us as if we had come from 
the tomb. Most of us had been reported killed. 

"In about three months," he said, with a sort of 
gloomy fatalism, "we'll all be chased out again. Each 
time we are treated with more contempt and it is a more 
ticklish proposition. I should not be in the least surprised 
if a good many of us would be killed this trip." 

He said it with such conviction that I asked him why 
it was he went back if he believed conditions were still so 
dangerous and unsettled. 



El Paso Loves the Military 23 

He turned to me with a face from which the bitter- 
ness departs only when he smiles, and said: "I hate it 
worse than I can tell you. I value my life as much as 
any one else, and the one who tells you he doesn't know 
what fear means, is a liar. But I've got to earn a living: 
and this is the only way I am able to do so, even 
thoug^h the Washing:ton Administration is unwilling to give 
protection to its citizens across the border." 



CHAPTER IV. 

Miners and Bandits and Weather Phenomena. 

El Paso possesses no village grocery store where 
stories are swapped over the cracker boxes, but its assay 
and real estate offices serve the same purpose. There, at 
almost any time of the day, one may drop in and find men 
exchanging yarns of their experiences in Mexico and 
along the border. The strange part of it is their 
tales are usually true, for in this part of the United States 
fate plays such strange tricks on its victims it is en- 
tirely unnecessary for him to embroider them upon rela- 
tion. As a rule, too, the men possess an unconscious 
modesty that leads them to minimize their adventures in- 
stead of exaggerating. They are merely recounted as one 
would in the East tell of a visit to the theatre. 

I dropped into the offices of W. H. Austin, who came 
to this city in 1882, when it was nothing but a group of 
adobe houses and a few ranches. Since that time he has 
been accumulating and disposing of real estate until he 
controls neariy one-sixth of all the ground in and adjacent 
to this city. There I found a group listening to the story 
of Norton Hand, who two weeks ago came out of Mexico 
under a military escort, the only survivor of three white 
men and four Mexican bandits who tired away at each 
other at a range of fifty feet until Hand alone remained. 

Norton Hand is a specimen typical of the country 
where a man is not judged by his clothes. His face is the 
color of a leather bag grown old in service. His eyes 

24 



Miners and Bandits. 25 

are a keen, light blue. He had a rolling straw hat, such 
as we are accustomed to see on farmers in caricatures. 
His shirt, light brown, with no tie, had evidently been his 
one best friend for many years. A pair of old gray trou- 
sers, for which neither belt nor suspenders were deemed 
a necessity, and a pair of old boots completed an attire 
that at no time could have weighed heavily upon his mind. 
Last year he dug out from his mine in Sonora $85,000 
in gold, and a short time ago purchased a ranch for which 
he paid $55,000. 

Two months before my conversation with him, Mr. 
Hand had started out for his mine near Magdalena, a small 
town in the State of Sonora, about eighty miles from the 
border. 

*'He was in here the morning he left,'* said Mr. Aus- 
tin, "and I told him he would be lucky if he came back 
alive, because I knew that if a Mexican gets a chance to 
shoot a man when he is at a disadvantage and there are 
no witnesses around, he will do it." 

"Well," drawled Hand, and the memory of his es- 
cape seemed mildly to amuse him, "you was pretty near 
right, but there I was and here I am. But I have made 
up my mind to one thing — that all the gold in the world 
isn't any good to a dead man, and there is a perfectly good 
mine down in Sonora belonging to me that any one can 
have that wants." 

After Hand had been down there about a month he 
was coming along the trail from his mine to Magdalena 
with his two partners, Parks and Dickson. At a particu- 
larly desolate point in the trail four bandits rode suddenly 
from behind the mesquite bushes in front and told them 
to hold up their hands. 



26 Along the Rio Grande 

"We all knew what that meant," said Hand. "If 
we dismounted quietly and did as we were told, one of 
the greasers would come over and place all our guns in a 
neat pile. The rest would stand us up in a row and shoot 
us one by one. Perhaps they would not even bother about 
the row, but they v/ould kill us anyway. 

"None of us cared for the program. We preferred 
to take a more active part in the party. We got oflF our 
horses on the far side of the Mexicans, and as we jumped 
we dragged our carbines out of their holsters. Poor old 
Greene got his the first crack out of the box. A bullet 
caught him in the jaw and went through the back of his 
head. He doubled forward with a gasp and only two of 
us were left. 

"Dickson was a little bit rattled, I think. He wasn't 
shooting good — he was pumpin* too quick and wild. In 
a couple of seconds he was drilled in three places," he 
pointed to a spot in the center of his chest, one in the 
abdomen and another below the heart. "I saw his gun 
wobblin' after that and he sank down to his knees. His 
last shot was his best. He made it from the hip and got 
his man square through the heart. The Mex screamed and 
ran about ten feet before he fell on his face dead. 

"It was all over in a jiffy, but while it lasted the 
bullets came so close to my head I could feel their heat." 

After a hasty mental calculation I figured that there 
were two Mexicans as yet unaccounted for and asked: 

"How about the other two? " 

"They died," he said briefly. I later learned from 
Mr. Austin that during all the years he had known Hand he 
could never be induced to say how many Mexicans he had 
killed. Whether it was because he considered it boasting 



Miners and Bandits 27 

or because he disliked to recall the tragedies I do not 
know, although I am much inclined to believe it was the 
former. 

''After I got into Magdalena, I had to walk, for all 
of the horses had been either shot or had run away," he 
continued. "I was arrested and chucked into jail. They 
took my clothes and money and kept me there for three 
days. I wasn't treated badly, but they made me pay for 
everything they handed me at prices which did credit to 
their imagination. At the end of that time they give me 
back $115 — I had $520 to start with. Why they did it 
I don't know, because it's contrary to all Mexican prece- 
dent. 

"A military guard took me to the border. We 
weren't allowed to pass through any of the towns. The 
peons all swore at us and threatened to murder me. They 
made us walk around every one of the villages — I was 
too low a thing to be allowed the privilege of the streets. 

**I got out all right and I don't want to go back 
again." 

The Sunday night before I had said good-by to a 
young chemist named A. C. Henry, who was returning to 
work in the mines at Cananea with some other Americans. 
He had told me that in the event of trouble he was com- 
ing back on foot — avoid the trails and hike to the border. 

I told Mr. Hand about it and asked him what he 
thought the chances were of his getting out alive. 

''Well," he replied, "any American that goes down 
into Mexico now is gamblin' with his life, and it's just a 
toss up whether he survives or not. If your friend knows 
the country pretty well, and does as you say, he stands 
as good a chance as any one of escaping when the next 



28 Along the Rio Grande 

uprising comes along, but It's an even money proposition. 
I was lucky, and the conditions are becoming worse. Each 
time it becomes harder for Americans to leave Mexico. 
The greasers hate us worse than tarantulas, and think 
that we are about two de.^rees lower in the scale of life. 
No one can tell what will happen when trouble again 
starts. And it's going to start. 

Soldiers at Camps Pershing, Stewart and Cotton were 
introduced on July 1 7 to their first dust storm, something 
which they had begun to believe was a fiction of the East. 
Several of the tents were torn loose from their moorings 
and many others were only prevented from flying away 
by the caution of the men within, who sat determinedly 
on the sides of the walls. 

After the dust came the rain, and the tents were 
treated to an undesired irrigation. Many of the men toiled 
industriously while the shower was at its height, digging 
ditches around their tents to carry away the young rivers 
pouring over the ground everywhere. It has been so long 
since there has been any real wetting in this part of the 
country — this was the second in eight months — that many 
of the men had decided it would never come. It found 
them unprepared. 

At the time the storm started I was riding with H. A. 
Macrale, manager of the Austin Realty Ccmpany, to a 
little place fourteen miles from El Paso called Ysleta. 
Never in the East have I seen a storm that equaled this 
in splendor nor in discomfort. 

Ysleta is a land of ranches and farms. One sees 
more green in a square foot of it than El Paso possesses 
in a square mile. 

Alonfi: bv the side of the road were numerous box- 



Miners and Bandits. W 

shaped adobe houses inhabited by Mexicans. From time 
to time the dark-colored people would pass us in carts, to 
which were hitched animals of any description; sometimes 
a couple of burros, a mule and a horse, while once we saw 
a mule and an ox side by side, drasfgins: the vehicle along 
at a gait that signified that manana would do as well as 
any other time for the date of their arrival. 

Off to the right, rising abruptly from the green of 
the plains, rose a blue range of mountains over in Mexico. 
Soon the few clouds in the east, which had been drifting 
lazily about in a brilliant sky, began to thicken and be- 
came a mass of lead in the distance. 

Shortly it changed to a golden glow. Far from 
us the wind had sprung up, carrying tons of sand in its 
grasp. A little in front we could see two twisting columns 
of white, miniature cyclones preceding as advance guards. 
These broke up and gave place to others. 

Then came with them the wind which screeched by 
at sixty miles an hour. It tore the hat from a worried peon 
near by us and took it sailing like a small balloon high 
up into the air. The sand, which feels more like gravel 
when it beats against your face, blinded us and it was al- 
most impossible to see more than a few feet ahead. 

With the unquenchable ardor of a Texan when honor 
of his native State is concerned, my companion shouted 
to me from behind his handkerchief: 

''Say, this isn't anything compared to some of the 
storms we have here. I've seen it so you could hardly 
breathe and it took the skin right off your face." 

I was too busy to mention to him that it was with 
great difficulty that I did breathe, and that the skin was 
being taken off my face. We tied handkerchiefs over our 



30 Along the Rio Grande 

faces and managed to reach Ysleta, where we hurried to 
the shelter of the Valley Inn, a little place which is the 
center of activities of Ysleta. 

Just then the stopper was pulled out of the sky and 
there followed a more enthusiastic, thorough-going rain 
than it has ever before been my pleasure of experiencing. 
Each of the drops contained at least a quart. They fell 
on the tin roof above the porch with a thud that sounded 
as if some one were deluging it with baseballs. Holes 
were dug in the ground where they struck. 

The main street — it is the only one in Ysleta that 
can be called a street at all — was soon flowing from curb 
to curb with a river of mud reaching nearly to the feet 
of the rangers, cattlemen and Mexicans who watched it 
from the shelter of the store entrances, with undisguised 
satisfaction. 

The downpour soon ceased, but every little while 
after that, as if to show it still had a kick left in its system, 
it broke out anew. 

It traveled off up the valley in a strip not greater than 
a half mile, with the sun shining down on either side with 
a brilliance doubly increased by the contrast. Fifty feet 
on either side of the lane one would have found it as dry 
as it has been for the last month or so without a drop to 
dampen it. 

The people of Ysleta began to emerge from their 
places of retreat. 

Every one began talking to every one else of the 
shower, and business (with a small b) was resumed in 
Ysleta as usual. 



CHAPTER V. 

Private Perry and the Scars Which Are His Memoranda. 
Concerning T'rant*las and Sichlike. 

There is one man in tlie Nintli Massachusetts In- 
fantry to whose blase soul the skirmish with a Mexican 
band of snipers across the Rio Grande on July 18, in 
which two of the latter were seen to fall, brought little 
thrill. His name is Charles T. Perry, private, who has 
killed so many of our dark neighbors in his former ca- 
pacity as a ranger in Arizona that the only purpose they 
now serve him is a means by which to remember dates. 

If you are trying to recall the time of the Lusitania 
disaster he can be of assistance. He will pause in thought 
but in a moment he will have it. 

"Oh, yes,'* he will say, ''that was in April, I9l5, 
the year I got Toddwin. He had murdered a prospector 
and thrown him down a well. He hopped over to the 
Indian reservation. I went after him." 

In the engagement with the Mexicans a short dis- 
tance east of El Paso, near Camp Cotton, Private Perry 
was credited with hitting one of the two killed. 
Companies L, A, C and D were on outpost duty at 
the time. Early in the morning a couple of their 
members came down to the river to obtain water for their 
horses. A few hours later, at 11.45, the United States 
men were fired on from ambush. A couple of Mexicans, 
one of them because of his sabre believed to be an officer, 
dashed out from cover. Shots were fired at the American 
troopers, which were promptly returned. The officer and 

31 



32 Along the Rio Grande 

the man with him dropped. Two others came out and 
carried them back into the bushes. The exchange of 
shots soon ceased and the bandits retired in the direction 
of Juarez. 

All of this was in the day's work for Perry, 

The thing about the whole affair that seemed to in- 
terest him most was that Private Shields had just arisen 
from a cracker box the instant before a bullet struck it. 

He pulled off his shirt as he was telling me about 
it and began to wash up, for, in spite of disturbing inter- 
views, army life must continue just the same, and if 
mess call finds them in the class of the great unwashed 
at 6.30 the condition must remain unchanged until their 
meal is finished. 

I noticed that his body was covered with a number 
of scars — so many that if one walked over to him with 
one's eyes closed and touched him one could scarcely 
miss a spot that served to keep his memory clear about a 
certain incident. 

From then on our conversation much resembled a 
game of tit-tat-toe. I would indicate a scar and he would 
tell me its history with a naive matter-of-factness that 
at once indicated a surprise at the presence of that par- 
ticular adornment and reminiscence of the manner in 
which it had been acquired. His brown eyes gazed out of 
his bronzed face with a roundness as he talked that made 
his tale all the stranger. His anecdotes were mere skele- 
tons of events— figurative skeletons born from real ones. 
They needed no elaboration. 

His shoulder was drawn in a red pucker with a num- 
ber of near-dimples. 

*'Buckshot," he answered from the midst of his pan 



Private Perry and the Scars. 89 

of water In answer to my query. "Got that in the 
I. W. W. riots of 1914. They didn't riot lon^, though. 
When they got through we made them eat all of their 
red books — everything except the wire binders." 

He drew his dripping head out of the pan, rubbed it 
dry and pointed to a white shriveled lane on the right side 
of the top of his head. 

"The man who killed Joe Mink at the Arro mine 
give me this," he said. "He escaped to Magdalena, over 
in Sonora, after the shooting. Jim Powers, George Sears 
and I went over there after him. We found him in an 
adobe dance hall. When I came through the door I got 
that." 

"Did you capture him? " I asked in what I fear must 
have been a breathless tenderfoot manner. The proper 
word to have used was "get." 

"He came back with us," was the response. 

The mention of George Sears and Jim Powers re- 
called to his mind others of his old friends that rode range 
with him in Arizona before he enlisted with the militia. 

"There was Sam Hadwick, Perry Sears, brother of 
George; Billy Wilson, George* Collins, Billy Wolf, Jeff 
Adams, Jim McGee and a bunch of others, all of them 
princes," he said. 

"Billy Wolf used to be under sheriff at Maricopa 
City several years ago. He was standing on the station 
platform v/ith his sister once and a Mexican threw a 
brick at him. (Border Mexicans never seem to learn to 
stop doing foolish things.) The brick went right be- 
tween them. Billy shot him. 

"Jim McGee, who used to be our captain," he con- 
tinued, "nearly got his from the Sontag-Nevins gang he 



M Along the Rio Grande 

was after near Phoenix once. He was hit square in the 
front of the forehead and back in town he was reported as 
dead. Later while all the fellows were talking about it 
In walks Jim as large as life. You can't kill him. 

"George and Perry Sears started on a cattle ranch 
in the Palo Verde ranch. Some Mexicans took some land 
near them and went into the sheep business. Pretty soon 
their cattle began to disappear and the Mexicans branched 
out into cows. George and Perry tied the Greasers on 
their burros and chased them across the border to where 
they belonged." 

Some may think ranger methods of dealing with 
Greasers strenuous, but none can deny they are effective, 
for the only thing that a Mexican properly appreciates is 
force. 

I saw that we were getting off our subject and I 
tried to get him back by asking where the wound in his 
neck came from. 

"That was a present I received in Phoenix in 1913 
when the Mexicans went off on a rampage. I stopped 
some lead in the leg at the same time." 

Altogether Perry has taken an active part in 800 
arrests and a number of hangings. 

"I pulled the traps for a couple of guys in Florence," 
he informed me. 

I assured him that my knowledge of a trap was that 
of a new born babe. He proceeded to elucidate. I 
learned that in Florence, a small Arizona town, a steel 
platform had been built, in the center of which were two 
doors which swung downward when the "trap was 
pulled." This allowed the victim to drop into a chamber 
beneath after it was quite certain that his neck had been 



Private Perry and the Scars. 35 

broken. The walls of the dungeon underneath were lined 
with pictures of criminals, with nooses around their necks, 
who had met similar fates. Of course he who has just 
departed into the life beyond is unable, however, to appre- 
ciate their artistic merit. 

"Some complaint used to be made by the prisoners," 
Perry told me, "because, after the man about to be hanged 
walked up the path leading to the platform, they could 
see him from their cells." 

A prison, I was told, was no place for sensitive 
feelings. 

He pulled on his shirt and the guide-book of the 
scars was hidden from my sight. I just had time before 
he hurried off to mess to learn that he had joined the 
Ninth Massachusetts up in Nactic, Mass. He had gone 
there after making a trip to New Orleans with some 
Federal prisoners. If we have no war with Mexico and 
the troops are sent home he will again return to his old- 
time haunts. 

Up to the present moment more than 200,000 de- 
scriptions of the flora and fauna of the border have been 
mailed by the soldiers of our country from El Paso alone 
and I see no legitimate reason why I shouldn't have just 
as much right to describe them as they. It seems better 
not to defer the task any longer, for letters are leaving 
that city at the daily rate of 50,000, and every moment 
takes the edge off the knowledge which is about to be laid 
before those in the North. 

It is strange to one who has not made a business of 
traveling with the troops to discover how much larger in 
numbers and size all of the insects and i-ptiles of this 
country are than they are described in the encyclopedia. 



36 Along the Rio Grande 

Of the tarantula in particular, all of my preconceived ideas 
have undergone revision. 

I have learned (from conversations with the militia- 
men) that the troops are in constant danger of annihila- 
tion by these creatures, and were it not for the unceasing 
vigilance of the men the dan2:er threatened by the Mexi- 
cans would be a small matter in comparison. 

To truly understand this one must have a fuller ac- 
quaintance with the nature of the beast. It is innately 
vicious, a viciousness that no care and kindness is 
able to eradicate. Gratitude it knows not the meaning 
of. For days a tarantula has been known to live and be 
nourished in the tent of a trooper and in the end turn to 
bite his benefactor. Aesop's proverbial snake was a Good 
Samaritan by contrast. The only explanation of their 
complete lack of success up to date in increasing mortality 
is the low order of their intelligence as opposed to that 
or the soldier. 

Camps Pershing, Cotton and Stewart, I am told, 
swarm with them. Vv^ith all their faults the tarantulas 
cannot be accused of inhospitality, for upon learning of 
the arrival of the troops they journeyed thither in droves. 
Each morning the man assigned to tarantula duty clears 
off the paths in front of the tents in order that the men 
may walk unmolested to their shower baths. 

Even with this precaution there is ,5:reat dan^'er, for 
Old Tarant can jump from five to thirty-five feet, accord- 
ing to the distance required. One might be wanderin'? 
along in a place utterly devoid of life, feelino; perfectly 
safe, yet the next moment some dark object would 
come hurtling through the air and one would be in a death 
struggle with one of the tigers of the desert. When that 



Private Perry and the Scars. 37 

moment arrives one must abandon all his preconceived 
ideas of fighting like a gentleman. Biting, strangle holds, 
toe holds and gouging are all quite within the rules of 
tarantula warfare. If you ever come to that part of the 
country don't hesitate to strike a tarantula when he is 
down, and even though he be a few pounds lighter don't 
feel that you are fighting out of your class. 

The tales I had heard made me somewhat curious. 
I knew not what they looked like nor yet had I seen one. 
I went down the row of tents in Battery B of the ?vlassa- 
chusetts Artillery asking if they "had any tarantulas to- 
day." None could be produced, although if I had only 
come a few minutes earlier I could have seen scores of 
them. Only that morning one had been discovered nest- 
ing slyly above the head of one of the drivers' cots. Help 
had been summoned by a bugler who in his excitement 
blew fire call, police call, reveille and first call to mess 
one after the other, and the enemy was put to rout with 
no loss of life. 

"What do they look like?" Tasked, for I was de- 
termined to get some definite information. A private was 
discovered who had seen one. 

"They're like a big spider," he said, and then added 
impressively, "with nippers." There was a world of ex- 
pression in that "nippers," and I knew that if I could once 
behold a pair of those terrible instruments I could there- 
after be threatened by a crazed man with ice-tongs in his 
hand without it in the least disturbing my equanimity. 

"Go on," I pleaded. "Tell me more." 

It was with reluctance at first that he did so. One 
who has been in intimate contact with a tarantula is apt 
to be silent ever after on the subject. He reminded me 



38 Along the Rio Grande 

of the hero in a story published in a magazine some 
months ago. The man was considered a great conversa- 
tionalist. He had just returned from the front after hav- 
ing been wounded, and was awaited at a London club by 
some friends who expected vivid tales of the war. He 
came. His friends hinted, but not a word of the war did 
he utter. The horrors of that awful conflict had com- 
pletely silenced the man who had never been silent before. 

However, after much persuasion, I induced my 
tarantula man to continue. 

"They're hairy," he said, "and have got lots of 
legs." I had a mental picture of a cross between Lionel 
the dog-face boy and a centipede. His face as he lay 
on his cot was drawn with the strain of what he was tell- 
ing me and I felt a brute for forcing him to do it. 

"I'll tell you what you do," he said, after another 
spasm. "Go over to the top sergeant's tent over in 
Battery C, the next row. He's got one in a glass and 
you can see for yourself what they look like." His face 
relaxed and I could see that a load was lifted from his 
mind. He stepped to the entrance to his tent and pointed 
to a khaki dwelling at the end of a long line, which con- 
tained the object of my search. I mopped my brow and 
hurried, although the temperature was 106 over there. 

I found the sergeant in the act of depositing a small 
striped snake in a glass holding a spider about the size 
of one of the cartwheels which they give you in El Paso 
as a substitute for dollar bills. 

"What's that? " I asked, indicating the spider. 

"Tarantula," he said, without removing his fixed 
gaze from the snake. 



Private Perry and the Scars. 39 

"Why, I was told that they were about five feet 
around the waist line," I protested. 

"So they are — the parents," he informed me, "but 
this here is a young one." With that he let go the 
wriggling tail of the snake and said breathlessly, "Now 
watch!" 

I watched, but at first the snake was inclined to be 
friendly, although his friendliness was tinged with im- 
passivity. 

"Stir 'em up a bit," he remarked, cautiously insert- 
ing a pencil underneath the cover of the glass. The 
tarantula made vain efforts to spring out, and the snake 
struggled up the sides only to fall back again. But the 
pencil had done its work and an animosity was aroused 
tliat meant "to the death." 

The spider, suddenly impressed with the idea that 
the snake really had no business in his glass, after all, 
took a vicious snap at him with his twin claws. Snakes 
may be sluggish, but no one could have accused this one 
of being a moral coward. Although his opponent was 
fully his size, albeit assembled differently, he forced him 
to the ropes and grabbed him by the middle of the back. 
The tarantula's feet twitched up and down, and at last he 
broke the hold and countered with a right and left to the 
snake's neck (if one doesn't call his whole body his neck). 
A black juice exuded from him. The sergeant immedi- 
ately became concerned. 

"Got to drink out of that," he said, and, hastily 
clearing a path through the ring-side spectators, he carried 
the glass and its contents outside of the tent and deposited 
them on the ground. 



40 'Along the Rio Grande 

Both of the principals had by this time attained a 
healthy respect for each other's prowess, and they made 
off in opposite directions. No one attempted to detain 
the tarantula, but the snake was once more seized and 
brought back to captivity. He may still, according to 
present advices, be found in the tent of the top sergeant 
by all vv'ho care to view him, ready to meet all comers. 

There are also in this country horned toads, scor- 
pions, centipedes, gila monsters, rattlesnakes and flies, 
the luxuriant cactus and mesquite bushes, each with a 
history as long as that of the tarantula, but the ribbon on 
my machine has run out and their description must be 
deferred. 



CHAPTER VL 
The Hermit of El Paso. 

Troops may come and troops may go. The militia 
may mobilize and the United States may go to war with 
Mexico, but to Bill Dickinson, who is hailed as El Paso's 
only hermit, it matters little. Technically he is not an 
El Pasoan, as he lives far out in a blistering desert of sand 
and cactus a few miles across the line in New Mexico. 
But no other town claims him and he claims no other 
town. About once in three weeks he comes to El Paso, 
driving a skeleton of a horse kept alive by little else than 
an unkind fate, to purchase provisions enough to last until 
his next visit. 

Concerning him there are the usual conflicting ru- 
mors. Some say he has a fortune in gold hidden away in 
his ranch of sand; others, that he occasionally receives a 
pittance from the County Poor House sufficient for him 
to sustain life. 

One of the theories must be correct, for it is impos- 
sible to conceive of any manner in which he could extract 
a living solely from the barren land which surrounds his 
strange dwelling. 

One reaches it after traveling miles through lonely 
hills of reluctant sands and nothingness. Everything 
seems to have retired to leave him in his seclusion. Even 
the mountains, which the clearness of the atmosphere in 
most parts of this country brings almost within a stone's 

41 



42 Along the Rio Grande. 

throw of one, are dim and blue in the distance. Once, 
when Dickinson first came here in 1883, the Rio Grande 
flowed near his place, but since then it has changed its 
course and is more than a hot mile awa3\ His only neigh- 
bors are a foreman and his gang of Mexicans, the sole 
inhabitants of the desolate town of Anapra. 

When I arrived there with some friends Mr. Dickin- 
son was not at home. We had picked the one day in a 
long three weeks on which he had gone to El Paso. We 
decided, hov/ever, to pay him a call, nevertheless. 

If a man's dwelling is indicative of his character, the 
character of Mr. Dickinson is unusual indeed. 

I had never seen anything like it before, and if I 
ever nappen on another one I will certainly consult an 
alienist. It seemed as if Bill Dickinson had made a mental 
bet to build a dwelling with a minimum amount of ex- 
pense and a maximum amount of other people's property. 
It is constructed entirely of railroad ties split in all sizes 
and shapes, wire, nails and ice molds, which in their 
original form are oblong boxes of iron, but had been 
hammered into flat strips of metal wherever needed. 
Aside from a few boards these were the only ma- 
terials used. 

The roof, a wide V, was a silent testimonial to what 
can be accomplished with patience and molds. Beneath 
it stretched a row of other ice molds calculated to catch 
the water shed by the roof during the rainy season. When 
filled these would be removed and others substituted. 
Presumably this water was used for cooking and other 
purposes. It was the rainy season along the border, but 
up to that time it had amounted to a name only, and 
Mr. Dickinson's water-catching devices had not been 



The Hermit of El Paso. 43 

a huge success. I gazed into several of them. A few 
contained an oily scum of rust and dirt; others were com- 
pletely dry. In one reposed the corpses of two lizards 
fallen there In happier days. 

On each side the hut contained a porch, one of its 
greatest luxuries. Two dogs of indeterminate breed re- 
posed on some burlap bags on the front one. About 
them was a pile of bones. Thirty-three years ago Dick- 
inson must have owned other pets and the bones gnawed 
by each and every one was there. 

The animals started a furious barking when we en- 
tered. The sight of unknown humans was strange for 
them, but as soon as they discovered what we were their 
threats turned to a frenzy of joy. The two windows in 
front were boarded up and the door padlocked. 

In order to gaze into the gloomy interior of the 
house we had to go around to the side which boasted one 
muddy pane of glass. 

There were two rooms, one a combination bed and 
sitting room containing a large adobe fireplace, a cot 
covered by a Navajo blanket, and a rocking chair incon- 
gruous among the rest of the surroundings because it was 
intact. There were a few books on a primitive shelf, 
also built of railroad ties. I was told that the hermit was 
a great reader and interested in subjects of every 
variety. 

Over the roof was an arrangement resembling a 
wireless outfit that supported a flagpole flying his private 
signal, a gray rag. One could almost reach the top of 
the pole by a pyramidal ladder which he had erected. 
What purpose it served I cannot imagine, unless it was 
to afford him a closer view of his banner. 



44 Along the Rio Grande. 

Over in the back of his home was a barn, an impos- 
ing affair of two stories. The topmost was reached by 
a substantial stairway of ties v/hich led into the loft 
where his hay and other supplies were stored. 

Once chickens v/ere kept on the place, but they were 
unable to survive the intense heat. Now all of the 
feathered kind which remain are a few pigeons, the last 
of a flock upon whom hunger has made a constant inroad. 

Below the barn roof, which resembled that of the 
house, was the same water catching devices described 
before. 

Nothing was growing on the property save the usual 
weeds of the desert. It is much to be doubted if any at- 
tempt had ever been made to raise anything else. 

In spite of this Bill Dickinson recently sold some of 
his land to a man with imagination for $5o an acre. El 
Paso is in the throes of a real estate boom which has its 
foundation in its remarkable growth, and people are now 
willing to pay any prices for even desert land in the ex- 
pectation that the city will continue to spread. 

We waited some time for Mr. Dickinson to appear, 
but at last decided to start for home. We had only gone 
a few miles when we met him driving an old freckled 
white horse, the father of his kind. 

We stopped to talk with him, and his horse en- 
thusiastically anticipated his wishes by halting before his 
master had voiced any desire in the matter. 

Dickinson is more than 85, — no one knows just how 
much, — and he does not enlighten them. He looks as if 
he might be any age up to 115. His hair is snow white 
and reaches to his shoulders. His beard extends from 
a wrinkled, browned face to his waist 



The Hermit of El Paso. 45 

It was some time before I could divert my attention 
from his remarkable whiskers. The verse telling of the 
man in whose beard a lark and a wren, two owls and a 
hen had nested kept running through my head. He 
would have had room for all of these inhabitants, a 
kitchen stove and a pound or two of cactus plants. I 
am not quite sure, even yet, that he didn't. He might 
have posed for George Sorrow's description of Brute 
Karl: 

"A wild swine on his shoulders he kept 
And upon his bosom a black bear slept. 
And about his fingers with hair o'erhung, 
The squirrels sported and weasel clung." 

His sombrero, overalls and shirt had all of them at 
one time been treasured possessions of previous Dickin- 
sons. 

"Don't you ever get lonely out there?" 1 asked. 

"No, suh. Ah like it," he answered. It appeared 
that he had come there from Arizona because that State 
had been too thickly populated to suit his tastes. He 
didn't like people nor their ways. A long time ago he 
had been a college student, but it had failed to strengthen 
his religious viev/s. On coming to his present abode he 
would frequently drive into El Paso and, standing in his 
rickety wagon, preach on socialism to the crowds 
gathered about him. Of this he soon became tired and 
the town saw less and less of him as the years went on. 

Now he sometimes goes in to attend church. 

"Ah'm getting old," he told me, "and although Ah 
don't beheve in God, Ah v/ish to heah what the preachers 
have to say about religion before Ah die." 



46 Along the Rio Grande. 

He had spoken far longer than usual and he sud- 
denly realized it with a start. He gazed uneasily in back 
at the alkali-covered bundles which lay in the cart ana 
chirruped to his steed. 

There was a commotion within the animal's skin. 
He kicked up a cloud of sand and stumbled forward. 

"So long," said Bill Dickinson. 



CHAPTER VII. 
Hopping Up to Cloudcroft. 

One of the hardest things to accustom oneself to in 
Texas is the attitude of the Texan to distance. When a 
person can travel for 1,200 miles without leaving his own 
State he is not very apt to regard a trip of one or two 
hundred miles as anything more than a jaunt to be taken 
as an appetizer before breakfast. 

It would not be surprising to learn that the wait- 
resses commuted to El Paso from Brownsville. 

So many people had asked me why I didn't take a 
''hop" up to Cloudcroft, a health resort 9,000 feet up in 
the air in New Mexico, that I began to wonder why 1 
didn't myself. 

I asked how far it was. There and back — 200 
miles; if you started at 7.30 in the morning you would 
get back at 7.20 in the evening. It seemed like quite a 
''hop" to me. 

In the East, unless a person were a traveling sales- 
man, he would get a headache packing the night before 
and the family would all be down in the station 
in the morning to bid him good-by before he started on 
a journey of similar length. He would expect to stay 
not less than a week. 

However, I hid this information from my question- 
ers and told them I had been planning right along to go 
to Cloudcroft, and I went. 

47 



48 Along the Rio Grande. 

There had been some talk then of establishing a 
military hospital there, and the soldiers were awaiting 
anxiously the decision. In Cloudcroft are found the fair- 
est of the El Pasoans, who know not how to while away 
the Summer hours; there is a golf course the highest in 
the world; hunting, horseback riding and dancing. 

Several of the militiamen had already visited the 
place on sick leave and, although their health apparently 
soon returns, it is usually some time before they feel tit 
enough to return, it was here that Captain Morey, the 
hero of Carrizal, spent a few days recuperating. 

From El Paso we took the train to Alamagordo. 
It is best to carry the name on a printed card, easily ac- 
cessible, for if one says it in a hurry, complications are 
liable to ensue that will result in the station being passea 
in the interim. 

Up to Alamagordo the scenery is like most of that 
found on this part of the border — oceans of all kinds ot 
cactus and alkali that stretch away into the distance until 
one wonders where so much of it comes from. More 
than thirty miles away it ends abruptly against a chain ot 
mountains. 

The cars are equipped with what are called reclining 
chairs, which resemble those found in barber shops. The 
greatest surprise of the trip is when the conductor fails 
to ask you whether you will have a shave, shine or hair- 
cut. 

By means of them one is enabled to lean away back 
and gaze interestedly in the face of the person in the seat 
behind. If the face happens to be that of a war-hke 
madre a return to the original position can be negotiated, 
though with difficulty. It was this type of seat, I believe, 



Hopping Up to Cloiidcroft 49 

that first started Texans on the path to the sociability tor 
which they are so famous. 

It isn't until one changes at Alamagordo and gets 
into the flat cars equipped with wooden seats like the top 
of a Fifth avenue bus that the trip really begins. 

The engine has scarcely begun to complain about 
its climb before every one in the car knows where every 
one else has come from and how long they are going to 
stay. The conductor sits down on the seat opposite you 
to ask which way your State will vote during the coming 
election. His name is Jim, he has ridden on the road 
ever since it was built, eighteen years ago, and can tell 
you exactly at what elevation you are without removing 
his eye from your watch charm, which arouses in his heart 
the sincerest admiration. Just why, it is hard to say, 
for it does not compare with the human tooth gold- 
mounted, which your new acquaintance across the road, 
Austin Miller, wears in his coat lapel. I believe it was 
the first that graced his childhood; he will still have it 
when all others are gone. 

Seated with me was a refugee from Mexico, who lett 
Monterey in Jose Madero's private car when things be- 
came too hot. All night, he told me, he had kept sticking 
his head out of the upper berth to listen to the sound 
of machine guns in the distance, only withdrawing It 
when he saw the head of the equally alarmed Madero 
issuing forth from the berth below. Early in the morn- 
ing he discovered that the noise of the machine guns was 
caused by the ticking of an automatic lamp. He then 
sank into a troubled sleep, but neglected to impart his 
information to the restless Madero. 

There was a disturbance in back of us. An East- 



50 Along the Rio Grande. 

erner had nearly sat on a paper bag to the shrieked dis- 
may of a young girl, later ascertained to be the daughter 
of M. B. Hutchins, the proprietor of the lodge toward 
which we were journeying. 

"O-oh, look out for my tortillas and enchilados," 
she screamed. 

His face expressed a grave fear that a tortilla was 
related to the tarantula about which we had heard so 
much. He shrank away. 

''Will they bite?" he asked. 

The girl told him they were harmless. 

"What is the dilTerence between a tortilla and an 
enchilado?" he inquired. 

"You simple thing," she responded, "an enchilado 
is bigger and more in it." 

The man from the East became interested at once. 

"A tortilla then, I take it," he said, "is the young 
and if allowed to grow will develop into the enchilado." 

My attention was distracted from the conversation 
at this point by the beauties of the scenery, and it was 
not until 1 reached El Paso again that I learned from an 
omniscient bellboy what they really were. A tortilla, he 
said, was a form of Mexican bread, flat and unrisen, like 
a pancake. An enchilado, on the other hand, was a lit- 
tle bit of everything — cheese, chopped meat and spice; 
with a tortilla on the outside, all of which is wrapped in 
a corn-husk. Neither could be sat upon. 

The railroad is a remarkable piece of engineering. 
It winds up the mountain on a grade that varies from 3-4 
of 1 per cent, at the lowest to 6 per cent, at its steepest 
— which, the conductor confided to me, was the biggest 
grade any road in the world attains, with the exception 



Hopping Up to Cloudcroft 51 

of the one up Pike's Peak, Colorado, which Is a cog rail- 
road. I have not verified his statements. 

Far below one in the valley you can see the road- 
bed twisting along the sides of the mountain. Some- 
times a bit of track a short distance below will have been 
left a half an hour ago. 

Through the gap in the hills far oflf in the distance 
could be seen a stretch of pure white sand, the only one 
of its kind outside of Egypt. With the sun shining on it 
it looks like a great field of snow. 

From the scrubby growth of mesquite in the lower 
part one travels into the midst of the healthiest bunch of 
pines and spruces near the summit to be found near El 
Paso. 

Occasionally one passes a native on the farms on 
the banks of the mountain stream. The natives can be 
distinguished from those who have recently moved in 
from the fact that constant walking on the sides of the 
Sacramento has shortened the left leg. 

Their lot is a hard one, for with the train passing 
them only once in the morning and again in the after- 
noon they can spend little time in waving and must at- 
tend strictly to business. 

I have read of the engineer stopping the train to 
chase a cow off the track, but it was not until we neared 
the summit that 1 knew such things ever occurred. How 
long the beast had been ahead of us 1 do not know, for 
after my attention was first called to it we gained on her 
but slowly. 

The passengers were cheering the cow — the fireman 
and the conductor were the driver's sole support. 

In time the cow became winded and balked, llie 



52 ^ "Along the Rio Grande. 

engine stopped. The engineer, flushed with triumph, did 
his duty. We continued to the end without interruption. 

The climb from Alamagordo to Cloudcroft takes 
two hours and twenty minutes. If one is lucky, and the 
brakes hold, the descent takes about the same length Oi 
time. 

Our brakes held and we arrived back in El Paso 
after witnessing a mountain sunset about which the news- 
paper writers there have raved so often. 

I, too, can now, as nonchalantly as any Texan, ad- 
vise a stranger to "hop" up to Cloudcrott. 



CHAPTER Vin. 
Our ''Starving" Army and Baking on the Border. 

After a talk with Major William Elliott, the Depot 
Quartermaster, U. S. A., who has charge of supplying food 
and clothing to approximately 75,000 soldiers stationed 
from the Pecos Highbridge at Dryden, Texas, to Yuma, 
Arizona, as well as all of General Pershing's men in 
Mexico, it is rather difficult to consider very seriously the 
stories which have been written about our "starving" 
militiamen on the border. 

"I don't know what the men had in the way of a 
bill of fare at home," Major Elliott had said to me 
in his offices at El Paso on a Sunday — he works just as 
hard on the Sabbath as he does on any other day of the 
week. *'I don't know what they expected, nor I don't 
know what they want, but I do know what they are get- 
ting. 1 know there is enough of it, and that it is of the 
highest quality. If the food of the men is unsatisfactory 
it is due to either one or two things; their supply captain 
is drawing his rations unwisely and not availing himself 
of the variety which he is able to obtain, or their cooks 
are incompetent and wasteful. 

*'The most common fault is the latter. Many of the 
militia organizations when they have gone into camp tor 
the Summer have hired expensive civilian cooks who have 
helped them to live in luxury. When they come to the 
border here they are required to assign men out of their 
own ranks to cook duty. These are apt to be inexperi- 

58 



64 Along the Rio Grande. 

enced and wasteful. They are unable to prepare their 
food properly and effect a saving in order that they might 
turn in their '-^used rations and receive a cash credit with 
which to get other things. 

"In the regular army are trained cooks. After hav- 
ing been in the service for three years they are required 
to take a three-year course in an army cook school. As 
a result the regulars, as a rule, draw about two-thirds ot 
the food allovv^ed them and are able to obtain variety with 
the money they save in this fashion or turn it into the 
treasury of their organization. For instance, I issued to 
one regiment $6,000 worth of food one month, and ot 
this amount only $2,700 was drawn. The rest was taken 
in cash. Many of the regiments lay aside in their treasury 
from $1,600 to $1,900 every month. 

"Most of the kicking comes from men who have not 
been getting in their own homes as good food or tood in 
as great quantities as they now are. Very little is heard 
from the man who has been accustomed to the 
best. Some of it originates with those who have arrived 
here and have found very little in the way of real hard- 
ship, but feel that they must write home and tell of the 
trials they have been enduring in order that they may ap- 
pear in the light of heroes when they return. 

"I am sure that 75 per cent, of the people in our 
country at the present time are not living as well as the 
United States soldier right here. The present system of 
issuing rations to the men has been the result of a hun- 
dred years of study on the part of the Chemistry Bureau 
of the Department of Agriculture in determining just what 
amount and what kinds of food are needed to maintain 
the men in the state of the greatest efficiency. 




A "starving' militiaman on the border. 



Otir "Starving" Army 65 

"A large part of the public labors under the im- 
pression that contracts are issued to the lowest bidder, 
but this is far from being the case. Thirty dealers may 
be bidding on a certain article, and the process of elimma- 
tion will begin with the lowest and work up to the highest. 
The award is determined by the price, the quality and the 
general efficiency of the dealer in delivering his product, 
but it is very frequently the case that the man who has 
put in his bid at the highest price receives the contract be- 
cause his quality is better than that furnished by the 
others." 

The Major pointed to a jar of blackberry jam on 
his desk. 

"There's another example," he said, tapping it with 
his pencil. 'The price fixed by the firm bidding on 
that was 25 cents a can, and others offered to supply it as 
low as 14 cents, but the quality of the others was not as 
good and as a result they were rejected. 

'There have been the usual cries of 'embalmed beet' 
in connection with the mobihzation. They're ridiculous, 
for under the conditions which prevail in army purchases 
it is impossible. All of the meat canned for the army un- 
dergoes three inspections; the first by the Department ot 
Agriculture of the living animals; the second by Govern- 
ment men after the meat has been dressed, and after this 
it is prepared under Government supervision and accord- 
ing to their specifications. Only steers are used, and the 
hind and fore quarters must be of a certain weight. I 
have seen meat canned for Government and commercial 
use side by side. Gristle and fat that would not be al- 
lowed in the food prepared for the army was used with 
the meat intended for public consumption. It would be 



56 Alone the Rio Grande. 

impossible for any of the men who think they are not 
receiving good enough food to purchase meat in the open 
market of as high a grade as ours, because it isn't sold. 

"Meat packed in this fashion will keep in perfectly 
good condition for five years, but long before there is 
any danger of its spoiling we have what is known as a 
forced issue — that is, the regiments are given material 
they must take and a fresh supply is then ordered to take 
the place of that distributed. 

"Just before this mobilization went into ettect 1 
made a forced issue of canned beef and salmon in order 
that I might have everything fresh for an emergency. 

"Under ordinary conditions the men draw their ra- 
tions in two forms, known as 'travel' and 'garrison.' 'ihere 
isn't a great deal of variety, of course, to the travel ra- 
tions, as they have to be in a compact form that will keep 
for a long period of time. They consist of hardtack, 
:anned beef, beans, tomatoes, jam, coffee, sugar and 
milk. The others are made up of mutton, bacon, canned 
meat, hash, dried, pickled and canned fish, turkey at 
Thanksgiving and Christmas times, flour, baking powder, 
beans, potatoes, onions and other fresh vegetables, 
prunes, coffee, sugar, evaporated milk, vinegar, salt, pep- 
per, cinnamon, lard, butter, syrup, flavoring extracts and 
bread. 

"It has been figured out that at the average price 
charged the Government for its supplies it takes 2 7 cents 
a day to keep a man in the healthiest and most efficient 
condition possible. If the different regiments wish they 
needn't take all of their rations. The regiments are al- 
lowed to turn in all they do not use and obtain either cash 
for them and buy outside or from the sales issue list. This 



Our "Starz'ing' Army 57 

list contains a great many items supplied to the men at 
cost price with the overhead expenses added, which 
amiount to about 5 per cent, of the total. 

"A lot of the trouble has been caused by the States 
themselves. Two hundred men came in from one of 
the Pennsylvania regiments to exchange some shoes and 
trousers that had been issued to them by the State in times 
of peace. There were 100 shoes sized 8-EE and seventy- 
five No. 14 trousers that had been handed out to the men 
regardless of the size they needed, in spite of the fact that 
any sizes could have been furnished to the State bodies if 
application had been made to the proper governmental 
department. 

"I don't believe," he said after a pause, "that there 
are many men in the army not receiving the best treat- 
ment in the matter of clothing, and if there are they will 
find that the remedy lies in their own unit. 

"You will see that the few who are complaining 
now, as v/ell as those who are not, will return back home 
in better condition than they have ever been before — 
harder, stronger and finer. And some day they wilJ 
probably admit it." 

After visiting the different military groups along the 
border, my respect for that household necessity, the Staff 
of Life, had risen tremendously. A lover of statistics, see- 
ing the army bakeries, would have a perfect orgy. it 
would not make much difference whether he went to 
merely the one at Nogales, Ariz., managed by Lieut. 
Francis W. Pinches of the First Connecticut Infantry, 
which works away for the benefit of 11,000 stomrvVhs in 
the Nogales district, or that in charge of Capt. C. A. Bach 
at El Paso, Tex., which doesn't consider it any trouble at 



68 'Along the Rio Grande. 

all to feed those in the El Paso district, or that in Mc- 
Allen, which bakes for the 19,000 of the New York di- 
vision. At any one, or all, he would probably become 
so full of facts that he would never after be able to eat a 
loaf without a shiver of awe running up and down his 
spine. 

Captain Bach is quite proud of his outfit in El Paso. 
I found him watching the men removing the steaming 
brown loaves from the three field ovens near Camp Con- 
necticut, at which the Connecticut troops are tented. 

'These are a lot better than the garrison bakery," 
he told me, "because the heat isn't so intense, and they 
can be allowed to cook slower and more evenly. The 
field bread is more compact and has a thicker crust, which 
enables it to be kept much longer, as the moisture is held 
better. Garrison bread will become dry after a short 
time." 

"How much do you turn out a day? " I asked. The 
question was simple, but Captain Bach is an enthusiast. 
Statistics poured forth in an avalanche. 

"We make 216 pounds at a baking in each of the 
three ovens," he answered; "that means 108 loaves 
apiece. The field and garrison bakeries together use 
from 15,000 to 16,000 pounds of flour a day. In all of 
the ovens there are three chambers, each one of which 
will hold seventy loaves. I've got sixty-one men work- 
ing for me now — a full unit — but when more troops ar- 
rive we will probably have to enlarge our equipment. 

"Everything is designed with a view to moving at 
an instant's notice, and if we were ordered into Mexico 
this minute we could take the ovens apart and pack the 
whole shooting match in a truck and be on our way. At 



Our "Starving" Army 59 

the first stop it would not take us more than an hour to 
have things set up again and the baking begun. While 
one detail was at work fixing up the stoves, the others 
would have the mixing tent up and prepare the dough. 
I'll show you what the tents are like/' he added, with 
pardonable pride. We turned from the sweating bakers 
and entered the tents of khaki and wire screen. 

The first was filled with pans scrupulously clean, 
moulding tables and dough troughs. In each of the lat- 
ter, he said, 150 pounds of flour could be mixed. We 
went into the storage tents where the bread was piled high 
in racks and where, unlike many places about the camps, 
not a single fly could be found decorating the land- 
scape. 

We went out into the open once more and watched 
the men toiling away at their tasks. 

Neither the work of the bakers themselves nor ot 
the man in charge is easy. If my opinion were asked 
as to one of the most uncomfortable employments 
in the land of khaki, I would be quite prompt in electing 
that of breadmaker. Many are assigned to the work. 
The field bakeries at McAllen, Pharr and Mission, which 
provide for the New York division at these places, have 
nineteen ovens. Forty men are at work in the first place, 
sixteen in the second, while Pharr has seventeen. Those 
who have been following the trials of their absent boys 
on the border are partially convinced, I should judge, 
that it is a place where heat is somewhat extreme. 

At Camp Stewart, about seven miles from the heart 
of El Paso, I have seen it 135 degrees in the sun. 
It is a waste of energy to speak of its being a certain tem- 
perature in the shade, for a person would get heat pros- 



60 Along the Rio Grande, 

tration in his anxious attempts to find such a thing. But 
even under the partial shelter of a tent occupied b}^ Capt. 
De Forest Chandler of the Si^s:nal Corps at Columbus, the 
officers one day were seen interestedly viewing the re- 
mains of a former thermometer. It was an unsophis- 
ticated Northern affair brought down by the captain him- 
self, and it only provided for the registration of 120 de- 
grees. It struggled nobly when the heat became higher, 
but to no avail. It burst. When one adds the v/armth 
of the ovens to the normal — or, rather, abnormal — heat 
of the land which v/e once, for some unaccountable rea- 
son, took away from the Mexicans, it can be seen why 
the position is one not cherished by all. The men as a 
rule take a certain pride in their work, which is the one 
thing that enables them to keep at it v/ith the spirit with 
which they do. 

Their hours, too, are long. Baking at McAllen tor 
the first shift begins at 2 in the morning and continues 
twelve hours for each squad. Other bakeries have largely 
the same regulations and conditions which prevail there, 
with the exception that the hours in some cases are only 
eight hours a day. I should suggest as an excellent cure 
for strikers who feel that their hours are too long that 
they be given occupation for a time among the breadmen 
of the army, and after the experience there will be a deep 
and lasting content in their midst. 

It is rather natural, when time hangs heavy on the 
hands of a soldier who wishes he were at* home, that he 
grumble. He really isn't serious about it, and, in fact, 
derives a certain portion of his entertainment from this 
source, just as weepy females hie them to a tragedy where 
they can enjoy a splendid and gratifying sobfest. It is 



Our '* Starving"' Army • Gl 

one of the highest compliments that can be paid to the 
work of the big army of bakers, then, that, concerning 
the most important item in their bill of fare, one never 
hears a complaint — but on occasions, instead, will hear 
arising from the clatter of knives and forks a muffled, 
"Say, that's blame good bread." 



CHAPTER IX. 
The Lost Mine of Tayopa. 

One day late in July was bad, but in that it proved 
no exception to a great many other days through which 
El Paso had sweltered. I had spent the morning visiting 
Battery A of the First Massachusetts Artillery, which had 
not been of the slightest aid in becoming cooler, as the 
officially announced temperature of 95 degrees did not 
apply to Camp Pershing. There was no shade in which 
to find such frigidity. 

Two o'clock found me at the corner of Santa Fe 
and San Francisco streets. I turned up the latter partly 
because I had never done so before and partly because 
there was shade in which I could walk. I passed a rickety 
little old place with "Cantina" printed above the door. 
In the gloomy interior I could see a few tables and chairs, 
with some persons idling over their glasses. 

I stopped and stepped in, for I had discovered a 
spot into which sunshine never intruded — and sunshine 
had been pursuing me all the morning. 1 reflected that 
the shack must contain within something of a nature that 
atoned for its shabbiness without. 

The floor of the room was of unpainted wood, 
though it had long lost its original lightness of color. 
The plaster walls boasted the only paint on the inside of 
the establishment, in the far corner sat two Mexicans 

62 



The Lost Mine of Toy o pa 63 

hunched over their glasses of beer. They gazed sullenly 
at me when I entered. A few feet from them was what I 
took to be a rancher perched in lonely gloom on the edge 
of an insecure bench. 

I began to regret having yielded to my fatal curiosity. 

The proprietor was nowhere visible. I assumed that 
he was in ambush. Being as yet not thoroughly conver- 
sant with the ways of the West, I deemed it advisable 
to purchase something before I left. 

I sat down at a table, still holding with admirable 
zeal a trickle of stale wine left by some previous cus- 
tomer. It was the nearest the door, which, according to 
my viewpoint, was much in its favor. 

Presently, through a door leading to another room 
from which came a jabber of Spanish, stepped a buxom 
Irish woman with rolled-up sleeves — strangely out of the 
picture, but a welcome link to the civilization with which 
I was more familiar. 

"What'll yuh have?" she asked. I told her. 

While I was waiting I heard the bench at the other 
end of the room scrape. The rancher arose and came 
toward me. 

''Howdy, pardner? My name's Ellis," he said, sit- 
ting down. I mustered up a false enthusiasm, indicating 
my pleasure at meeting him. 

We exchanged the usual persiflage of new acquaint- 
ances. I awaited for the real object of his visit, for I 
suspected that the signs of the tenderfoot on me still 
remained, to the casual observer, about as conspicuously 
as a fireman's parade. My wait was not long. It ended 
with the arrival of the drink. 

"I used to work on a farm in Kansas," he began. 



64 Along the Rio Grande. 

"I'd never been in Mexico and knew nothing about it. 
Near twelve years ago, when I was weeding potatoes, I 
had a vision." 

I smiled. He scowled, and I stopped smiling. 

"I had a vision, I say," he continued, "of a bunch 
of mountains, a can^'on and a river. At the end of the 
canyon was a well. I didn't know what to make of it at 
the time, and 1 thought nothing more about it. Twelve 
years later I was in Madero, in the State of Chihuahua. 

"The same vision returned to me, and I made a 
map on a small piece of paper. I showed it to a native 
and asked him what it could be. 

"He looked at me with a queer excitement. The 
Lost Mine of Tayopa,' he gasped. I learned that there 
were hundreds of millions of dollars in the mine in almost 
pure gold, but long ago its location had been lost. 

"I intended to go there to stake out my claim, but 
trouble started, and all of us Americans had to leave. 

"Here I am busted. In Chihuahua there's millions 
in gold waiting to be taken out." 

He handed me a dirty paper on which was drawn 
a rude sort of map. 

"There it is, right there," he said, stretching across 
the table and pointing v/ith a grimy forefinger to a circle. 

"I don't want any money. I want to be grubstaked, 
pardner. Give me enough to git a mule, some grub and 
tools and you'll have a half interest in whatever I find. 
It sounds like a touch, but I swear to God I'm telling 
you the truth." 

"I'm sorry," I said, excusing myself somewhat 
hastily, "but when I was a child my parents made nc 
take a vow never to grubstake any one." 



The Lost Mine of Tayopa 65 

As I hurried out I heard him muttering something 
about a damn fool. I didn't stop to listen. 

Later that afternoon I called on a friend who is the 
manager of a mining company in this city. 

"Is there any such place as Tayopa? '* I asked, after 
a while. 

"Sure," he responded. "It's a little town down in 
the western part of Chihuahua.*' 

"Ever hear of the Lost Mine of Tayopa? *' To which 
he made reply: 

"People have been looking for it a great many 
years. A long time ago it is reported that it was worked 
by Franciscan monks. The wealth they obtained from 
it was enormous. 

"The records of the neiehboring town of Guaynopa 
show a great number of births, deaths and marriages 
that took place while the mine was active. 

"About 150 years ago the monks had trouble with 
the natives and they were forced to depart for Spain 
after burying all of the gold and silver bullion and the 
sacred ornaments and vessels which they had acquired. 
They also made out a complete report of the location 
and extent of the Tayopa mine for their headquarters 
in Spain, but in some way it was lost. 

"Years afterward there was a tribe of Indians in 
the town of Moris, near there, that seemed to have no 
visible means of support. The Mexicans tell how every 
once in a while when their funds became low one ot 
their number would disappear for four or five days, and 
when he returned would bring a chunk of almost pure 
gold that looked as if it had been cut right out of the 
rock. All believed the tribe had found the lost mine. 



66 Along the Rio Grande 

"Three years as:o a woman came to my offices. She 
said she had the records lost by the Franciscan monies. 
They had been obtained from a local Franciscan supe- 
rior. She would sell them to me for $5,000. 

"I asked her why some of her family didn't under- 
take the enterprise. 

" They tried it,' she replied. 'One day my grand- 
father started up the canyon with a pack of burros. Half 
way up he was stopped by a mysterious band. They 
warned him never to return or he would be killed. A 
few years later he tried it again. He never came back. 

" 'After that my father made a trial. He, too, was 
turned back with the same mysterious warning, and, when 
he later disregarded it, was never found again. If any 
one else wishes to attempt it they can — for $5,000.' 

"I didn't buy the chart. I believe she still has it; 
but as nearly as I can judge there really is such a mine 
near Tayopa that will yield a fortune to the man unearth- 
ing it.'' 

Quite hastily, I fear, I grabbed my hat and dashed 
to the elevator and out of the Mills Building. I returned 
to the cantina which I had left but a short time before. 

The man of visions had departed. Even the two 
Mexicans had gone. Once more the weighty waitress 
came through the passageway to the adjoining room. 

"Do you know the man who was in here named 
Ellis?" I asked breathlessly. 

"No, sir. I don't know any one named Ellis," she 
said, and stooped over to wipe oflf a table once more sup- 
porting an overflow of beer. 

As far as I am concerned, the "Lost Mine of Tay- 
opa" is lost forever. 



CHAPTER X. 
Marianna Culmanero, Heap Big Indian Chief. 

Only the fact that he is 74 years old and is nursing 
a bad case of rheumatism in his ri.8:ht knee prevents Mari- 
anna Culmanero, chief of the Ysleta Pueblos, from re- 
sponding: to the call to the colors. 

I know, because he told me so himself after an ath- 
letic conversation which, added to the heat, laid me up 
for the rest of the day. 

With a friend I sought him out one morning in the 
midst of his adobe splendor. Both of us Americanos knew 
quite a little English, but would never give Cervantes 
cause to think he had a rival in Spanish. Marianna could 
speak Spanish backward (I think he was doing it most 
of the time), but his few English v/ords left him some- 
what winded after using — for Marianna is old. 

My Mexicanese vocabulary consists of about sev- 
enty words in which the numerals and ''muy bueno" play 
an alarmingly conspicuous part. My friend is scarcely 
more fluent, but the sign language and a lot of excess 
energy is an amazing thing, for we learned many of the 
facts of Marianna's life — and many that were not facts. 

Down a long winding road we traveled to reach the 
ancient Indian — down a road that went through a coun- 
try which even under a 100 degree sun appears pictu- 
resque and beautiful. A little brown-eyed, barefoot Mexi- 
can boy came toward us, kicking up the dust betv/een his 
gray toes. He was singing with a gayness that knew no 

67 



CS Along the Rio Grande 

yesterday, something; about 'Tor la manana." The whole 
of a Mexican's life consists of to-morrow (manana), and 
I thought the song might contain the secret of it. I asked 
him the v/ords. He was moved to excessive embarrass- 
ment. 

"No spik Englis. My brother, he spik Englis," he 
informed me, so we followed him to his m^ud home, from 
which, after much internal skirmishing, his brother, who 
happened to be his sister, appeared. 

She couldn't recall all the v/ords then, but assured 
me that if we called again "por la manana" they would 
be ours. 

I asked her — somev/hat too pleased with my linguis- 
tic powers, I fear, for I had rehearsed the phrase before- 
hand — "Dond' esta la casa de Marianna?" 

She was somewhat startled — I was a little myself — 
at the sudden burst of Spanish. She pointed somewhat 
vaguely up the road, and hurried toward the door in 
which the fat, indiscriminate form of a wrinkled senora 
had suddenly appeared. 

Marianna we found in quite a pretentious one-story 
adobe dwelling — pretentious in that it had a wing added 
in the shape of a letter L and a porch built into the side. 

On the porch were a bench, a broken chair and four 
dogs, who began to bark vociferously in Pueblo. 

Marianna shouted at them; they reluctantly stopped. 
When quiet had resumed a white cur emerged from a 
door at the right and five curlets came stumbling after in 
an effort to overtake their breakfast. Bedlam broke loose 
again, and the old man had to renew his efforts. 

Marianna was glad to see us. He had just been 
about to drive a skinny brown horse to town, but that 



Marian na Culmanero 69 

involved a lot of v/ork, and now he could postpone it 
until later. 

*'Dond' esta Marianna?" I asked, for I was not yet 
sure of his identity. 

*'Me Marianna," he replied, tapping his chest. 

He moved toward his house. "Come sit down my 
house," he invited. 

We learned afterward this was the chief exhibition 
sentence — one in which he took a benevolent pride, but 
in spite of our noble efforts it was impossible to make it 
play a dominating: part in our subsequent talk. 

"You heap big Pueblo chief?" I ventured. I knew 
very well he was, but certain concessions must be made 
in order to start the ball rolling. 

"Mi hermana ochenta y cinco," he said, figuring 
it up on his fingers, as an aged, bronze face peered from 
behind the corner of the mud wall. My friend and I held 
a council of war at this inconsistent reply. By piecing 
our vocabularies together we figured out he was inform- 
ing us his sister was 85 years old. We failed to see the 
relation of this amazing information to my question, but 
the old woman seemed to beam on us with such pleasure 
afterward we hadn't the heart to insist that he confirm 
the big chief rumor. Maybe he wished to talk about ages. 

"Old woman?" I said, indicating the squaw, v/ho 
had now advanced to the shelter of a post, where she 
stood watching all we did in silent approval. 

"Mexicano muy mal," he answered, meaning that 
greasers didn't make a big hit with him. Maybe I was 
mistaken — he didn't wish to talk about ages, after all. 
We followed his conversational lead, and with loud en- 
thusiasm cried: "Si, si," several times. 



70 Along the Rio Grande 

In order to convince him that we thoroughly under- 
stood his conception of a Mexican, we staged an im- 
promptu pantomime, in which my friend played the part 
of a treacherous native who shot me, the noble Ameri- 
cano, through the back. Marianna seemed hugely de- 
lighted, and I began to feel that we were reaching a com- 
mon footing. He didn't like the Mexicans, furthermore, 
because they intermarried with his tribe, with the result 
that the children forgot how to speak Pueblo. 

"How much land you got, Marianna?" my friend 
wished to know. 

*'Me got Mexicano wife," Marianna answered. 

This rather startled me after the sentiments he had 
already expressed regarding Mexicans. I feared that per- 
haps we might have offended him by illustrating the base- 
ness of the Mexican. In the usual mixture of English and 
weird Spanish in which we offered our part of the talk, 
we intimated that we had only been jesting when we 
spoke about the baseness of the Mexicans. 

"No, Mexican muy mal," he answered, and, with 
this inkling to his character, I no longer was surprised 
to find him inconsistent. 

"Cuantos acres land you got?" my friend asked, 
thinking to get on neutral and undomestic ground. 

"Me got Mexicano nina," Marianna announced 
proudly. At that moment, as if it were the cue for her 
entrance, a pretty, little Indian girl came shyly out of 
the house. My friend, who has always been of a practical 
turn of mind, extracted a glistening quarter from his 
pocket and held it toward her. 

"Muchacho want dinero?" he asked. She acted 







^^" 



She appeared quite indifferent as to whether she got the 
money or not. 



Marianna Culmanero 71 

quite indifferent as to whether she ,!:::ot the money or not, 
whereupon a frantic anxiety evidenced itself on the part 
of the old man and his sister, who still leaned up against 
the post. Her bland smile left abruptly. Under their 
weighty urging, conducted in Pueblo, the little girl came 
concernedly forward and made a hasty grab for the 
money. 

"Muchas gracias," prompted Marianna, who was a 
stickler for manners. In a high, piping voice that v/as 
brimming over with self-consciousness, she repeated 
"muchas gracias" and retreated to her mother, who had 
come to the doorway. She delivered the wealth to her, 
as every well trained child should. 

Judging from the irrelevant replies which Marianna 
had made to our questions, I began to think that perhaps 
he could not hear well. When I inquired as to how many 
dogs he had, I did so in an extremely loud tone of voice. 

The chief drew himself up dignifiedly and informed 
me "Marianna no deaf," after which he said, "woof, 
woof," three or four times — perhaps to indicate the num- 
ber of animals having their domicile with him. He seemed 
to be hugely delighted with his dramatic power and 
slapped his knee violently, only to start with pain. He 
had forgotten his rheumatism for the moment. 

We also ascertained in the course of another two 
hours, which did great credit to our powers of induction, 
that Marianna does no work. He is the chief of a tribe 
of Pueblos, a rapidly diminishing race, of which there 
are only a hundred left near Ysleta. Originally there 
were 500. The chief himself speaks the pure Indian dia- 
lect, but some of the others are growing up as half 



72 Along the Rio Grande 

breeds, "Cafe, cafe," as Marianna expressed it, and are 
neglecting to teach their children anything but the Span- 
ish language. 

He has married a Mexican woman, although his 
first wife was a full-blooded Pueblo squaw. He owns 
about fifty acres of land and makes the young bucks 
work it for him just as he did in the days of old. 

When Marianna was much younger he used to have 
many battles with the Comanche Indians, whose trail 
came near his stamping grounds. Evidently the encoun- 
ters were not all in his favor, for he became quite breath- 
less when he tried to tell us of the splendors of their 
horses, war togs and fighting abilities. 

Now Marianna does little but preside at the three 
"fiestas" which his tribe holds during the year, and in the 
interim he becomes gloriously drunk whenever he finds 
the funds with which to do so. 

When the conversation began to lag, for we had im- 
parted to each other all of the information which we could 
manipulate with the few words at our disposal, we got 
Marianna to step out into the sun in order that we might 
take his picture. 

I am afraid that Marianna is vain, for he accepted 
with great alacrity. I am also afraid his rather handsome 
daughter is likewise vain, for she suddenly came running 
from the house and posed beside her father before I had 
snapped the picture. 

After the operation had been finished, Marianna 
seemed to be greatly troubled. He fixed his hand in the 
shape of a circle, pointed to his eyes, and uttered some 
words in which the word "post office" was the most 
prominent. I believe that if he had spoken in Pueblo I 



Marianna Culmanero 73 

would have understood him better. My friend and I 
again consulted. We decided that Marianna's eyes 
troubled him and he desired us to bring him a pair of 
spectacles from the post office. Quite triumphantly we 
told him so. 

"No, no," he said, and went through with the whole 
operation again. We finally ascertained that he wished 
us to mail him two photographs of himself, one of which 
he would show to his brother to make his heart ache 
with envy. 

He rose and hobbled in front of us into his house, 
motioning us to follow him. The room in which he slept 
was occupied by two beds, one flaunting a mattress and 
the other with slats only, a stand containing a dirty comb, 
a hairbrush and a cracked mirror. On one wall was a 
photograph collection of various members of his family 
looking sternly frightened as they faced the camera. He 
was particularly proud of one of his thirty-year-old sons 
in chaps and bristling at every point of prominence with 
guns. On the other wall were colored prints of various 
patron saints in the Catholic Church, for Marianna is a 
devout Christian. 

"Me go mountains," he said, drawing forth a well- 
worn brass crucifix from within his blue shirt, and then by 
semaphoring us indicated that he never parted company 
with his cross even while there. 

We had to go, and Marianna again became inarticu- 
late about the post office. 

"Muy bueno," we replied, again relapsing into the 
pure Castillian; "Adios," and left. 

Marianna would soon receive a picture of himself. 



CHAPTER XL 
Bathmg and Other Sports In Ysleta. 

If ever I become sick unto death, and undertakers 
begin to look at me with solicitous eyes, I will pack my 
bag with the remnants of my fast ebbing strength and hie 
me to the Valley Inn at Ysleta. If life fails to assume a 
more cheerful hue after that it will be because an unkind 
fate has already decided I have lived too long. 

I piled off the car which runs there from El Paso 
after thoroughly satisfying an interested m.otorman as 
to the object of my visit and the probable length of my 
stay. He assured me that he would probably see me 
again, and I felt that the sky was not all clouds, for I 
had a friend upon whom I could fall back in time of emer- 
gency. 

Half way to the inn I found my path partially 
blocked by a gentleman in shirt sleeves gazing intently in- 
to the vault of heaven. I stopped and searched into the 
sky, likewise thinking to see perhaps an aeroplane or 
something equally thrilling. But to my untutored eye noth- 
ing was revealed other than an intensely blue Texas sky. 

"Nothing there," he said to spare me any further 
effort, when he at last noticed that I too was occupied, 
'i was just thinking. 

"I am a philosopher," he explained, upon my ap- 
pearing: somewhat puzzled. 

We walked together to the porch of the little green 
inn and sat down to discuss the question further. 

''What branch of philosophy do you specialize in.? " 

74 



Bathing and Other Sports 75 

I asked. My ideas of what constitute philosophy are 
somewhat vague, but I was fairly confident that it must 
have branches, like cooking", landscape gardening: or trees. 

"Philosophy in its entirety," he said, adjustin.sf his 
spectacles and inspectin,^ me more closely. "I have 
evolved a new system whereby I can explain completely 
the phenomena of the universe — everything except 
God." 

Mv respect for him rose like a Texas thermometer. 

"When I was a boy my ambition was to become a 
public speaker. Later I turned to the study of philosophy. 
I am writing up my theories — they are in five volumes. 
Three are already finished and in readiness for the printer. 
The fourth is in hand, the fifth in preparation. I have 
already worked five years on them — there are about 5 00 
pages to each volume and my task will be finished within 
the next two years." 

He went over the first three volumes in detail. I 
have a confused memory of such words as iconography, 
ter^reminous, faradization and chthonophagy. Occa- 
sionally I could understand full sentences. Upon such 
occasions, concealing my elation as well as I was able, 
I would make some pertinent comment. As my reward 
he turned to me when we had finished v/ith volume 
II. and said, "I am surprised to find a young man so 
interested in philosophy. What business are you in?" 
I told him. It occasioned some alarm. 

"Please don't mention my forthcoming works," he 
said, "for it isn't ready to be announced as yet," — v/hich 
is the reason why his name is omitted. 

At pao:e 342, volume IV, we suffered an interrup- 
tion, in the person of one of the guests of the hotel. 



7(5 Along the Rio Grande 

"I am not in sympathy with your natural laws at 
all,'* she said. ''I believe only in divine laws." I moved my 
chair nearer to the philosopher. 

'*! know a lot of people who would have been 
killed if they had depended merely upon natural laws," 
she continued, and I began to see that there was a prac- 
tical side to her teachings. *'A woman acquaintance of 
mine was thrown out on her head in a rocky gully near 
here. The cart passed right over her neck. According 
to natural laws she should have been killed, but she kept 
saying to herself, 'I believe in the divine law, I believe 
in the divine law,' and her neck wasn't even scratched. 

''Another friend of mine lit a gasolene stove in the 
kitchen and went into the next room. She heard an 
explosion and ran back. The whole room was in flames, 
but she said to herself, 'I believe in divine law, I believe 
in divine law.' She v/ent into the room. The flames 
vanished immediately and she carried the stove safely 
outside. What do 3^ou think of that?" she demanded 
belligerentl}^ 

I thought it best to go to my room and unpack my 
bag by means of natural laws, so I left her and the phil- 
osopher discussing the pros and cons of her belief. 

After dinner, at which a number of officers from the 
regiment stationed at Ysleta were present, we adjourned 
to the sitting room, where Mrs. O. P. Lansden, the charm- 
ing and interesting ''manageress" of the inn, told us of 
the various raids recently made by the Mexicans in that 
vicinity and particularly of the one at Columbus in which 
a large number of those involved were friends of hers, 
and had either lived in Ysleta or had been stationed 
there for military duty. ... 



Bathing and Other Sports 77 

"It would not be surprising," she said, "if anotlier 
raid took place in this town, as there are only a few troops 
and three hundred Americans, compared to the 2,000 
Mexicans who live here." She also told how the inn, 
which is more than two hundred years old, being built 
of adobe beneath its outer coating of cement, was the 
' frequent scene of activity on the part of the Texas 
Rangers. 

"One night," she said, "I looked out and saw some 
men standing around the stove warming themselves. I 
thought at first they might be burglars, but I found out 
later that they were Rangers with some Mexican cattle 
thieves they had caught that night. They were getting 
warm before they took them over to the jail." 

I drank this all in until it was time for everybody 
to retire, whereupon I bethought me that I would like 
to have a bath. A Bath (capital B) in Ysleta is an affair 
fraught with adventure and peril. The room in which 
I slept was at the entrance end of the long sitting room 
opening on the much longer dining room. The bath 
was at the exit end, a distance which seemed to be about 
a mile and half. Far into the night I waited until all had 
retired into their rooms, which open on this passageway. 
I crept stealthily forth, in my hand a pitcher, which I 
had planned to fill with ammunition for the morning. 

I got away to a good start and reached the bath- 
room ahead of the field. I barricaded myself and pro- 
ceeded to the tub. A medium sized but friendly tarantula 
had beaten me to it and gazed benignly from the bottom 
of the bathing machine. I hated to do it, but necessity 
is the mother of cruelty, and I gradually drowned the 
poor creature. 



78 Along the Rio Grande 

The cold water refused to flow, but when I turned 
on the tap for the hot water it burst forth with a generous 
enthusiasm that more than made up for the deficiency 
of its neighbor and scalded me into the bargain. 

A half hour later, with my pitcher filled with hot 
water, I opened the door and gazed cautiously out into 
the dining room. Nothing was there, including the light, 
v/hich had been turned out, leaving the path to my room 
in darkness. I tried to remember the location of the curi- 
ous table in the room and stepped confidently forward. 

After five steps I was congratulating myself upon 
my success, when, with a tremendous crash, I tripped over 
the leg of an insistent chair. I sprawled on the floor 
in the midst of the broken pitcher. I began to recall the 
tales I had heard early in the evening. I expected the 
proprietress to look out from her door and say: "Is 
that you. Villa?" and then some one would empty a 
forty-five at me before I could clear myself. 

The water began to soak through my clothes, but I lay 
as still as a grave, murmuring with all the conviction I could 
summon: "I believe in the divine law; I believe in the di- 
vine law." I reviled all the natural laws I could recollect. 

Presently a door squeaked and a voice came out of 
the darkness: 

"Who's that.^" it said somewhat breathlessly. 

"Just me," I answered from my recumbent posi- 
tion, and then, feeling that I owed some kind of an ex- 
planation, added hurriedly: "Hot water." 

That seemed to relieve the situation. The door 
closed. I arose and groped the rest of the way to my 
room, rather successfully, as I only knocked one glass 
from a table at the far end. 



CHAPTER XII. 
Justice Along the Rio Grande. 

Somewhere in Texas, in a little town called Langtry, 
on the Pecos River, on the outside of a rather shabby sa- 
loon belonging to Roy Bean, Justice of the Langtry 
Peace, hangs a sign which reads ''Law and Whiskey Dis- 
pensed Here," and another below it, "Law West of the 
Pecos." It is the first inkling a stranger coming into 
this part of the country has that the method of apportion- 
ing justice differs greatly from any other part of the 
country. 

"Years ago," said Owen White, who was telling me 
of the strange ways of this country, as we sat on the 
porch of the Valley Inn, "a man was brought before 
Roy Bean on a charge of having killed a Chinaman. It 
was a new kind of a case for Bean and he didn't know 
exactly what to do. He looked through all of the cook 
books and encyclopedias which formed the sum total of 
his law library, but not a word did he discover bearing 
on the inadvisibility of sending a yellow man to the Land 
of Rice and Birds' Nests. 

" 'It's all right, " said Bean, as he turned the man 
loose. 'There ain't any laws I can find against shootin' 
a Chink, so 3^ou can beat it.' 

"Bean was quite a character," continued Mr. White. 
"When business in a legal way was slack he tended his 
bar and when a case was being tried he tended bar just 
the same. Justice was handed out along with the whiskey. 

79 



80 Along the Rio Grande 

"Bean once had a prisoner before him charged with 
intoxication. The Judge looked him over. 

" *Do you drink? ' he asked. The prisoner assumed 
his most innocent expression. 

" 'Judge, I never touch a drop,' was the virtuous 
answer. The Judge smiled and pushed a box of per- 
fectos across the bar. 

" 'Have a cigar then,' he said, and the case was 
dismissed. 

"Another time the body of an unknown person was 
carried into the saloon. The man had fallen or been 
thrown off the Pecos Highbridge. His pockets were 
searched for something by which he could be identified, 
but a revolver and J^16 in cash were all that came to 
light 

"Bean was equal to the emergency, however. The 
man is fined $\6 for carrying concealed weapons,' he 
ruled, and the problem was solved. 

"Justice is manipulated a good deal the same way 
in Shafter, the town where I'm living now, by a peculiar 
old chap named Bob Dent," continued Mr. White. "I 
would probably never have met him if my manner of 
being introduced to the place hadn't decided me to move 
there. / 

"1 had heard about it before, of course; it is 
one of the few old towns where the atmosphere of 'Wolf- 
ville Days' still remains. I thought I would go down 
and pay it a visit It is about fifty miles over the hills 
from Marfa — and no railroad runs through it. When 
a person once gets there it is rather hard to get him out 
if he is undesirable. As a result they do their humble 
best to prevent any one staying there over night, unless 



Justice Alon-ir' the Rip Gmude M 

there is no chance of his becoming' a burden on thecom- 
niunit}-. 

''When I blew in there a walking arsenal came up 
to me and asked: 'Well, what's your business in town?' 

"I didn't have any, but I kept the information to 
myself. 'Now that you make a point of it, my business 
isn't any of yours,' I replied. 

" 'I'll damn soon make it mine,' he said and drew 
out his forty-five. 

" 'Put that plaything: away,' I advised him, 'or I'll 
take it away from you and spoil it on your face.' 

" 'I guess we better go in and talk your errand over 
while we're having a drink,' he conceded, so I was in- 
troduced to Shafter and eventually to Bob Dent. Later 
I bought a ranch there, which I still have. 

"Game lav/s are not usually strictly enforced in 
Shafter, but Jim Bailey had been violating them more fre- 
quently than we thought advisable. 

"One day he came into town with three does he 
had shot, and boasted to everybody in the place about it. 
It was decided that an example would have to be 
made of him.. Bob Dent was -a little nervous as to just 
how Bailey would take it. After figuring the problem out 
with Luke Russell, he planned to have the latter charged 
with killing forty-seven quail and then fine him to show 
Bailey others were receiving the same treatment. Russell 
agreed and when his case was called before the court 
pleaded guilty. He was fined ^30 and costs. He prompt- 
ly paid with money that had been supplied him. 

"Jim Bailey stepped forth for his case. 

"'Are you guilty?' asked Bob, after announcing 
that the defendant was accused of illegally shooting does. 



82 Along the Rio Grande 

" Tes, I'm guilty/ responded Bailey, 'but all the 
men in Presidio County can help pull the rope that hangs 
me before I'll shell out any coin for it.' Dent was balked 
only temporarily. 

" Tou're fined two barrels of beer,' he said, and 
the residents of Shafter saw that the fine was paid. Dent's 
judicial rulings frequently involved liquid refreshments. 

"Frequently in Shafter Mexicans working in the 
mines would get too much firewater in their systems 
and make the town uncomfortable, but Dent's methods 
proved effective in keeping them quiet during long 
stretches of time. We rounded up thirty of them one 
day. We didn't wish to keep them in jail because the 
jail wasn't big enough. It was an unnecessary expense 
anyway. Once more Dent's ingenious mind solved the 
difficulty. He hired an interpreter and a court stenog- 
rapher in order that the expenses might be worth while. 
Then he proceeded with the trial of the disturbers of the 
peace. They were all fined generously with the not in- 
significant items of costs attached. The mining company 
went bail for them and required them to work out their 
debt. It took them a long time to do it. During that 
period Shafter was not disturbed by these thirty Mexi- 
cans." 

"It's a rather picturesque form of legal procedure," 
I said when he had finished, "but don't you think that 
justice would be doled out more effectively if the courts 
were conducted along accepted lines?" 

"No, I don't," he answered. "I've been a lawyer 
long enough to know that as a rule a legal man's chief 
ambition is to defeat the ends of justice. Take a man like 
Dent or Bean, for instance. They know the kind of 



Justice Along the Rio Grande 83 

people they are dealing with, and by using common in- 
stead of legal sense they get results which your courts in 
the larger cities can't touch." 

Shortly after my talk with Mr. White I went into 
the combination ice cream parlor, dancing room, cigarette 
shop and court house, conducted by Jean Foix on Ysleta's 
main street. Things are rather conveniently situated for 
Judge Foix, as when a case is called he need only step 
from behind the cigar stand into an adjoining patio, 
where criminals meet their just deserts over the ice cream 
tables. 

The Justice, a thin little Frenchman owning the 
town's only brown beard, was conducting a case when 
I entered. I arrived just in time to see the lawyer for 
the plaintiff wipe the perspiration from his brow after a 
heated accusation of the defendant and take his seat. 

The lawyer for the defendant started to arise, but 
Mr. Foix motioned him wearily to his seat. 

"We've heard enough talking," he said, "let the 
case go to the jury." 

That night at the Inn I questioned H. M. Colvin, 
who has spent a good deal of his time in Ysleta, about 
the surprising Monsieur Foix. Colvin told me that last 
year he had brought a damage suit against an El Paso 
chauffeur who had previously lost control of his car and 
run into some property belonging to an Ysletan. The 
chauffeur v/as arrested and haled before Foix. 

Throughout the trial the chauffeur's lawyer kept 
earnestly demanding from Foix that he produce the war- 
rant by which his client had been arrested. Foix kept 
assuring him equally earnestly that he could keep calm 
and not worry about the warrant — he would see it in due 



-84 Along the Rio Grande 

season. As a matter of fact no warrant had yet been 
issued. 

Finally, after Foix had heard all he wished to, he 
said: "It has been moved and seconded that the court 
take a recess." The court proceeded to do so. 

"Foix came up to me right afterward," said Colvin, 
-"and whispered, 'For God's sake, Colvin, go and swear 
out a warrant I can show to this guy.' " In this simple 
fashion were the wants of the opposing attorney satis- 
fied. 

Mr. Colvin related more stories tending to prove 
that Foix, like other small town Texas judges, was an 
exceedingly human as well as practical person. But, in 
the words of the gentleman himself, "There has been 
enough talking. Let the case go to the jury." 



CHAPTER XIII. 
Forty Years Too Late. 

Although the fault could hardly be said to be all 
mine, I arrived in Douglas, Ariz., nearly forty years too 
late. I went up there to see the entire First Brigade of 
New Jersey militia, the First and Seventh Cavalry and the 
Eleventh, Eighteenth and Thirty-fourth Infantry regi- 
ments. It required little perspicacity to discover, how- 
ever, after a talk with *'Hod" Randall, whose Christian 
name happens to be ''Horace," though I don't think his 
family was reasonable in wishing it on him, that the real 
interest in the land of the border faded years before the 
soldiers now overrunning the towns had dofifed their 
long dresses for more manly and comfortable short 
trousers. 

I was told that I should see the Y. M. C. A. in 
Douglas, where the soldiers spend much of their time, so 
I hied me to this one shortly after reaching town. 

The Y. M. C. A. possesses a wide porch and numer- 
ous benches. I took advantage of the liberty allowed 
a free American citizen in this country and sat down on 
one of them. In the next pew but one two men were 
conversing, at least one was talking and the other, a tall, 
anxious looking man whose face gave the impression of 
perpetually leaning forward like the Tower of Pisa, was 
listening. The shorter man, whose gray hairs were pro- 
tected by a wide sombrero, seemed, in spite of his age, 
to be in excellent conversational trim. I argued such a 

85 



ft(? Alofig the Rio Grande 

person should be able to cast much light upon the stran^^e 
land in which I found myself. I joined them. The person 
of angles I ascertained was called Al Savin and the other 
Hod Randall. 

"Do you know this country pretty well?" I ques- 
tioned brilliantly. 

"I reckon I do," said Hod Randall. He stopped, 
slowly opened his coat and plucked from an inside pocket 
a match to light his cigar. His partner took advantage 
of the pause. 

"I know a place " he began with a sort of 

pleased enthusiasm. But Randall hastily manipulated the 
light and interrupted. 

"I reckon I'm as familiar with the border as any 
man in the United States," he said, with a silencing glance 
at Savin, who relapsed into a discouraged calm. 'Tvt 
been in every State except Maine, New Hampshire, Ver- 
mont and the Philippines. I'll tell 3'ou what I did once. 
I drove eighty-five mules from Chihuahua City, Mexico, 
to Denver, Colo., in 1884. 

"I was born in Petersburg, Mich., but I didn't stay 
there long. I came down into Texas and settled in a 
little cattle town called Magdalena. Drat that cigar!" 
He reached again into his inside pocket. I heard a com- 
motion on the other side of him. 

"I know a place near " It was Savin. There 

was a puflF of smoke from Randall, and Savin was switched 
to a siding. 

'Them was the good old days," continued Randall 
reflectively, just as if no one had spoken. He stroked an 
imaginary beard on his chin. I noticed that the fore- 
finger on his left hand had lost its first two joints. I 



Forty Years Too Late 87 

looked at the other hand. One joint was missing. "Them 
was the days for excitement and sich like. These boys," 
and he indicated some of the militia, who, in the room 
inside, were writin.g to their sweethearts, "these boys 
should have been around in Magdalena then. We had 
men that could shoot when they had to. Every one 
packed a gun, so there was something to keep us in- 
terested all the i'me. Cuss that cigar!" 

Al was a little quicker. His words tumbled over 
one another. "I know a place near Yuma " I was be- 
coming interested. What was it that had happened at 
the place near Yuma? But deferring his light for a few 
minutes, for he had been taken unawares. Hod inter- 
rupted. 

"Listen," he said sternly. "This fellow doesn't 
want to hear about Yuma. Tm tellin' him about Mag- 
dalena. 

"Magdalena was a tough old town in the eighties. 
We couldn't get a marshal to stay there long. They 
got shot up. We'd gti 'em from outside towns so the 
boys wouldn't know their records, but it didn't do no 
good. I was sittin' in the store one day after our last 
marshal had died sudden in a shootin' scrape. 

"Patten, who chose the men, said to me, 'Hod, 
how'd you like the job? ' 

"I said 'No.' Sittin' along side of me on the pickle 
barrel was a little Virginia cuss named Sam Galen, weigh- 
ing about 100 pounds. He was a stranger in town. He 
looked interested. 

" 'How much does the job pay? ' he asked. 

" 'Hundred and fifty a month and privilege of run- 
nin' a monte game without a license,' i told him. 



88 Along the Rio Grande 

" 'Can Ah have it? ' he says to Patten, kind of anx- 
ious. 'Ah haven't got a job, and Ah'll earn that 150.' 

" 'Sure, if you can hold it down,' says Patten. 

" 'If Ah don't you needn't pay me,' the little chap 
tells him, so he was our new marshal. Damn that ci- 
gar!" Savin looked at him rather cautiously as he 
searched out a match. He decided to risk it. 

"As I was sayin,' near Yuma " but before he 

could go further Randall, ignoring him, interjected re- 
proachfully, "1 was tellin' you about Magdalena. It looked 
as if there would be trouble for him from the start, and we 
all expected it. He escorted all the women that came 
to town up the street and wheeled their baby carriages 
for them and was always around when the high school 
let out to see that there wasn't any swearin' goin' on 
near them. Then he got the town to pass a rule that 
every one must stop carryin' guns and hitch their bosses 
to the post in front of the store when they came up for 
their mail. 

"One day a gun fighter called Jack Bess rode into 
town with his gang. They were all carrying guns and 
none of them tied their bosses. Sam stepped out of the 
saloon. 

" 'Men,' he said, 'you'll find it out soon enough if 
Ah don't tell you, but Ah's the new marshal heah. The 
town has passed a rule that you-all will have to hitch 
your bosses so they won't run away and hurt the women 
and children. You'll have to take oflf youah guns and 
leave them with the bahtendah or in youah saddles/ 

"Bess laughed. 'Whoever told you you were a 
marshal, you little runt? ' he said. 'This is the only way 
you'll ever get my gun,' and he started to draw. 



Forty Years Too Late B9 

*'Sam snatched out his .45 and jumped toward 
Bess. He hit him square between the eyes with the butt. 
Bess dropped cold. Sam drew his other gun and wheeled 
on the rest of the bunch. 

'' 'Now, quick/ he snapped, 'drop youah guns on 
the ground. In two seconds Ah stahts shootin'.' 

'It didn't take them long. The next instant 
Sam was gatherin' 'em up as if they was kindling wood 
and took 'em in to the bartender. By the time he came 
out the bosses was all hitched. He bathed Bess's face 
off and he soon came around all right, but that was the 
last time he had any trouble with the men." 

'Tuma " essayed Savin. I was figuring I must 

go to Yuma some day, just as Randall again broke in: 

''Bess was a bully, but always gettin' the worst of 
it from some one," continued Hod serenely. "There was 
bad feelin' between him and a little sissy guy called 'Little' 
MacGhee. Bess went out for Mac one day with a sawed- 
off shotgun. MacGhee, who was out in the street on 
horseback, seen him comin', however, and got the drop. 

'in his little high, squeaky voice MacGhee said: 
'I'll shoot you, Jack, just as soon as you raise that gun.' 
Bess got so excited when he seen 'Little' had the drop on 
him that his gun went off accidentally and blew his toe 
off — damn cigar's no good, anyway," he added, just as 
if it were all one sentence. 1 had given him the cigar. 
He threw the offending v/eed far out into the street and 
then turned to Al Savin with the air of a man who has 
borne a great deal in patience. 

"Now, what about Yuma?" he demanded fiercely. 

"Why, I only wanted to tell our friend," said the 
Pisa-faced one apologetically in a high voice, "that a 



90 Along the Rio Grande 

good many years ago up near Yuma there used to be 
some wild camel. The Gov'mint bought 'em for packln' 
purposes, but they went and got sore feet on 'em and 
they were turned loose." He began to hurry, as if in 
fear that he would not be allowed to fmish. 'They got 
to be bunches of 'em; they stampeded the cattle and 
the ranchmen killed most of 'em ofif. A few years ago 
some people from Ringling's circus came out and roped 
five of 'em." 

"Huh!" said Randall to Savin more scornfully than 
I thought justified. ''He knew that." 

It was late and I had to go. 

"Come back again, son," he said cordially, "and 
I'll tell you about some more shootin' scrapes if I can 
keep Al here quiet" 



CHAPTER XIV. 
Douglas, Another Port of Entry to Mexico. 

Coming from El Paso to Douglas one is allowed to 
forget for the greater part of the time that there are any 
human beings out in this section of the country. Jack- 
rabbits, little molly cottontails and partridges pay small 
attention to the train as it goes snorting by, for the only 
care on their minds is how to defeat the undertaker of 
the desert, the turkey buzzard, in his mission. Occasion- 
ally the vast stretch of mesquite stretching oflf to the dim 
mountains in Mexico is broken by the presence of a 
house. It looks as if some one had built there in a fit 
of absent-mindedness and, when he later viewed his work 
in vast surprise, had been too lazy to move. The engine 
gives a whinny of joy, there is a grinding of brakes, much 
commotion on the part of the crew and the train comes 
to a halt. The house is a city — perhaps its name is Con- 
tinental. 

If there is more than one building in the town, which 
is not often the case, it is with the utmost diificulty that 
the engineer can be induced to leave the place of such 
urban joy and the stop is long enough to give all of the 
inhabitants ample opportunity thoroughly to inspect the 
train, its contents and to make the appropriate comments 
amid great wagging of heads. If such an interesting item 
as its being on time is added there is much joy. 

Continue this way long enough and you will find 
yourself in Douglas. Of course you are rather curious 

91 



9S 'Along the Rio Grande 

to know just why Douglas should have been unloaded at 
this particular place. The answer is the same one re- 
ceives regarding any border town of any size — it is the 
State's main port of entry to Mexico. Then, of course, 
in the case of Douglas, there are added reasons, which 
consist of two gigantic copper smelters, the Copper Queen 
and the Calumet and Arizona. 

The Douglas station is quite magnificent. After one 
has seen the town one views this edifice in the light of 
a waiter's dickey- — the money has been spent where it 
will make the greatest impression. In Douglas there are 
about 14,000 people, all of them with well muscled legs, 
for, in order to negotiate Avenue G, Douglas's pride and 
joy, it is necessary to be more or less of an Alpine ex- 
pert. It is being paved by the street contractors in a 
way best calculated to develop agility among the citizens. 

Recently I was sitting down on a curb waiting for 
a car — it is for this purpose that Douglas curbs are built. 

"Who owns that building?" I asked my next door 
neighbor, pointing to a four story brick building (they 
don't grow much higher here). 

"Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Company, of which Wal- 
ter Douglas is general manager," he said, 

"And that one? " I asked again, picking out another 
at random. 

"Phelps-Dodge," he answered. I became rather ir- 
ritated. If Phelps-Dodge owned all of the buildings on 
Main street I would disappoint my friend. I pointed to 
the one most distant thing I could see — the smokestacks 
of the Copper Queen. 

"I suppose Phelps-Dodge owns that, too? " I said. 

"Yes," he said. 



Douglas, Another Port of Entry 93 

"And the railroad?" 1 continued hopefully. 'The 
answer was the same. I gave up. Other people must 
possess property in this city besides the Phelps-Dodge 
Company, but I did not summon up enough ambition 
since to find out who. 

Before 1900 there was no Douglas. It had its birth 
in that year for the principal reason it afforded an ample 
water supply for the smelter which the Copper Queen 
Consolidated Mining Company proposed to build to han- 
dle the vast quantities of ore shipped from Bisbee, about 
thirty miles from Douglas. The 4,000 regulars and 
militia from New Jersey who spread their tents within 
its long streets, lined with low brick buildings, found it 
a bustling, growing city. Douglas was good to the troops 
and seemed to appreciate the v/ealth which they brought 
to it more than the majority of border towns. 

One of the militia officers stationed here, after eat- 
ing for several days at the Gadsden Hotel, decided that 
the privates impeded too much the service which the 
officers should receive. 

"Look here," he said to the proprietor, "I think 
ril have the privates excluded from eating at hotels." 
The proprietor's attitude was calm but forceful. 

"If you do," he said, "the hotel will exclude the 
officers too." He picked up the officer's check for lunch- 
eon, together with one just turned in by a private of the 
Essex Cavalry. The former's check amounted to 60 
cents, while the other totalled ^4.5o. 

"And there are more of them than there are of 
you," the hotel man added. 

In other ways Douglas catered to the soldiers. 
Band concerts were frequently given. The privileges of 



94 '^ Along the Rio Grande - 

the Country Club were turned over to them. Whenever 
they wished they were allowed to sit in Douglas's park. 
In order to give some idea that this was no small conces- 
sion, I quote from the Douglas International. 

"The park," it says, "is a fit gamboling place for 
sylvan nymphs, spritely elfs and Lilliputians." 

I was not certain under which classification the 
troops come, but judging from the numbers I saw there 
they enjoy the gamboling and other sports it aflforded 
to the fullest extent. 

Contiguous to Douglas is the little Mexican village 
of Agua Prieta. Whenever Douglas is unable to enter- 
tain its visitors in other ways arrangements can be easily 
made for a Mexican battle in the tov/n across the border, 
a good view of which can be obtained from the Arizona 
side of the line. The latest incident of this sort was last 
November, when Villa attempted to take the town. 

A casual observer, going to one of the border posts 
so that he could be positive he was not treading on foreign 
soil and looking intently across at the dilapidated village 
of baked mud, might fail to realize why Villa struggled so 
hard to invest it, for it doesn't look as if it would fetch 
more than $1.60, Mexican money, at an auction sale. 
But he would be very foolish in so supposing, for it is of 
great strategic importance, due to the railroad which 
passes through. Villa's failure to capture it proved the 
turning point in his career. 

Over at the Copper Queen Smelter I ran across a 
man who had been an eye witness of the battle. 

"At noon Villa's advance guard took a position by 
the quarantine slaughter house," he said, "but the real 
fighting didn't begin until one. I was here in the smelter 



Douglas, Another Port of Entry 95 

yard at the time and soon the bullets began to whistle 
above our heads from Villa's guns south of Agua Prieta. 
I saw a workman and his wife standing in the doorway 
of the engine house. I told them they better get inside, 
but they laughed at me. Just about then a rifle bullet 
struck the tin roof and went singing oflf into the air. 
They soon took my advice. Another woman was in the 
door of the general oflfices watching the battle. I ad- 
vised her to go in also and right after she had done so 
a cannon ball passed through the window. The machine 
shop foreman was the only person hurt here. A cannon 
ball struck the heel of his shoe. 

"From here we could plainly see the artillery fire 
and the shells as they blew up big clouds of dust — usually 
quite far from their target. There was only one man 
who seemed to be a good marksman. He kept dropping 
them right into the midst of General Calles's men. The 
Mexicans were exceedingly calm and brave, however. I 
saw a couple of young fellows leave a field piece which 
they had been firing and walk casually over to a machine 
gun without even dodging when some close shot dug up 
the ground in front of them. 

"At 6.30 in the morning Villa retired after losing 
200 men. Only forty-five of Calles's were killed and 
seventy-five wounded, yet enough ammunition was burned 
to wipe out an army of 20,000. 

"The dead soldiers and horses were left out in the 
field for a long time and then some Mexicans went out 
with buckets of kerosene and burned them up." 

On two other occasions Agua Prieta has been the 
scene of conflict, and each time Douglas inliabitants have 
assembled on the border as interested spectators. Things 



9(^ Along the Rio Grande 

have been quiet for many months, however, and when 
the town again awakens to activity it may be due to an 
invasion by the United States army stationed in 
Douglas. 

With the greatest care I one August night stuck my 
head out of the window of a car filled with workmen, 
most of them Mexicans, on their way to begin their 
nightly task at the Copper Queen Consolidated Smelter. 
A short distance ahead, above the shadowy outlines of 
the smelter, rolled vast billows of flaming smoke, as bril- 
liant as if a city were burning beneath them. 

1 gazed awhile in profound thought and then came 
my inspiration. The gateman, I had heard, had been 
born and raised along the border. Much of his time had 
been spent in Mexico and his life was inseparably linker 
with mining and smelting. With the busy plant handlin. 
an average of 6,000,000 pounds of copper a year asi:^ 
background for the tales he would tell me, I would pf 
suade him in his simple, untutored fashion to unfold 
me fanciful tales of wealth that had been found ^ 
wealth that had been lost across the border. jt 

I jumped blithely off the car when it came f 
destination and stepped within the entrance. I sea. 
out my man. He seemed quite glad to see me — a ' ^ 
man is more or less isolated in the matter of compan^ 
and he is glad to see almost any one. 

He was the usual Western type in appearance. A 
rather serious thin face— which the hght from the smelter 
showed me was the customary bronze, a drooping mus- 
tache and a sombrero hat. 

We conversed casually at first about everything in 
general and nothing in particular. Occasionally an in- 



Douglas, Another Port of Entry 97 

terruption occurred in the form of some soldier who 
wished to come within to fill his system with facts regard- 
ing the process of smelting. 

"You've been in Mexico quite a lot, haven't you? " 

"Well, I should say yes," he responded, "five years 
or more." There was a louder roar than usual from the 
direction of the smelter. Along a huge beam amid a 
great clanking of chains, a glowing slag-pot, lighting the 
sky above it, was being carried. At the end of the trav- 
eler it stopped. It slowly tilted forward. Workmen 
hurried away to a safe distance as a stream of orange 
molten metal poured forth into the car below it, splashing 
a fountain of bright drops into the air. 

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" I said, enthusiastically. 

"I've seen it pretty often," was his rather non-com- 
niittal answer. 

I I returned hastily to our former topic of conversa- 
N on. 

sa ''Did you ever hear of any lost mines while you 
th re down in the country? " I asked, 
gui. ''Oh, yes; there was lots of them tales floating 
the md," he said. At intervals of a few minutes the slag 

<ould be dumped and the darkness be banished by 
e of color. Things were as I had hoped. 

"I never paid much attention to them, though of 
course there's places in Sonora where there's a pile of 
rich gold and silver and copper ore and the like of that, 
but I didn't ever take much stock in them." 

"Did you ever hear," I continued, "that a few years 
after Cortez had conquered the country he sent out ex- 
ploration parties all over Mexico, who discovered great 
quantities of gold and silver? In 1530 Alminidez Chiri- 



98 Along the Rio Grande 

nos had gone up as far as the mouth of the Yaqui River, 
followed by De Vaca, and the latter brought back a report 
that the place was literally jammed with gold." 

The gateman became mildly interested. 'There's 
lots of them tales," he repeated, ''but I don't believe 'em." 

I became more eloquent. 

"One of De Vaca's men," I said, "by the name of 
Sebastian, told how he saw the 'Seven Cities of Cibola,' 
ruled by King Tatrax, seated in gorgeously jeweled robes 
on a throne of gold before an 18-karat cross. Mermaids 
sat about him playing on diamond harps." 

I looked at him expectantly. 

"There may be mermaids and thrones of gold and 
sich like," he replied dubiously, "but I never seen them." 

"There's another mine they tell about," I continued 
undaunted, fixing my gaze on the pot of fire once more 
undergoing the splendor of being emptied, "which was 
discovered by the Yaqui Indians during the first half of 
the eighteenth century. It was called the Plancha de 
Plata. The Jesuits took from it immense quantities of 
almost pure silver — some of the nuggets as heavy as 
twenty and fifty pounds. 

"One day they unearthed a lump weighing more 
than a quarter of a ton. They loaded it between two 
mules and took it to the capital. There it was seized by 
the Government, who declared that this nugget and all 
the others previously taken out belonged to the crown. 
After this the Indians and Jesuits proceeded to 'lose' the 
mine." 

I paused. He contemplatively dug up the alkali 
v/ith the point of his shoe. 

"I think folks gets to exaggeratin' when they tell 



Douglas, Another Port of Entry 99 

stories like that," he said. ''I don't believe they ever 
found no ore v/eighing a quarter of a ton and the like of 
that. I did hear tell once that in the northern part of the 
Magdalena Mountains they was a mine a fellow worked 
that paid good. When he died he wouldn't tell no one 
where it was and they've been a-lookin' for it ever since." 

I became quite excited. ''What was the name of 
the man that found it? " I asked. 

"Well," he answered, '' I don't reckon I just recall 
now. I never did take much interest in yarns about 
silver and the like of that. Up here about four miles," 
and he jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward Arizona 
in general, "lives a ranchman that could probably tell 
you, though. He offered a reward of $30,000 for any 
one that located the mine." 

"And what's his name?" I asked. 

I was getting down to bedrock. He paused a 
moment in thought. "Well, I declare," he drawled after 
a mom.ent in mild astonishment. "I reckon 1 can't just 
recall that now." 

I decided to try him on something else. 

"Did you ever hear of Dona Maria, the widow of 
an old Spaniard called De Rodrigues?" I asked. "They 
say she saved nuggets of gold taken from her husband's 
mine for years, until she had enough to make a load for 
a caravan of forty mules. Then she took it to Mexico 
City, where she put it in the safe-keeping of the Spanish 
viceroy. A short time after she disappeared and the 
bullion was appropriated by the Government Treasury. 

"I knew a good many Dona Marias in Mexico City 
and one place and another," he responded after due 
thought, "but I don't reckon it was the same gal at all, 



100 Aloni^ the Rio Grande 

for I never did hear no sich tale as that. As I said 1 
don't believe that I would take much stock in it if 1 had. 
They's always people tellin' you hard luck stories like 
that down there and I come so that I never pay much 
attention to them. They's gold down there sure, and 
silver, sure, but they's a heap sight more now that people 
can't get into Mexico than there would be once they got 
down there lookin' for it. I suppose they's some lost 
Spanish mines. They get lost quicker than the others. 
But I dunno, I reckon I'll stay here awhile." 

"Why do they get lost quicker than the others?" 
1 asked. Perhaps I could learn something definite from 
him. 

"Well," he replied, "they went in shorter holes. 
They'd dig down aways and put in a long pole with 
notches in it that they could fit benches in. Then they'd 
dig in sideways a bit and go down again with another pole. 
Our shafts is made deeper and it would take one of 'em 
ten times as long to fill up as it would one of those old 
Spanish fellows. So that's why they get lost so easy," 
he concluded. 

A car came rattling up to the plant. They only 
run every hour, so I bid him adios and climbed aboard. 
I was not sure as I gazed back at the big black serpent 
climbing out of the funnel to blot out the stars above 
whether I had interviewed or been interviewed by the 
gateman. But any way "I reckon I don't take much stock 
in interviews of the accepted form and the like of that." 



CHAPTER XV. 
Bisbee, the Hidden City. 

If some one were to take you to the top of some 
high mountain, ten or fifteen miles from Bisbee, from 
which a complete view of the surrounding country and 
its hills could be obtained, and then told you upon pain 
of death to "go find Bisbee," your life would be in im- 
minent danger. Bisbee is built in the Mule Mountains in 
a gulch and is about as well hidden from the disturbing 
gaze of the outside public as it well could be. It is not 
until one gets within a few miles of it that there is the 
slightest hint of its existence. It springs out at you when 
you approach, in a struggling train, with the suddenness 
of a practical joker. 

Once on the main street, however, you can see 
practically all of it at once — just gaze up into the air and 
there it is. It looks as if some huge ogre, in a fit of ennui, 
had thrown a bunch of houses in the gully and said, 
"Now climb up, cuss you." The houses which had kept 
in the best physical trim climbed the highest and left their 
dirtier, less agile fellows on the lower levels. 

The word high class must have originated in Bisbee, 
for the higher one goes the better is the society in which 
he finds himself. 

Of course there are drawbacks as well as advantages 
in this business of building on the side of a mounta.in. 
Two years ago a man, in a fit of intoxication, stepped off 
his back yard one night and landed fifty feet below on the 

101 



10? Along the Rio Grand f 

property of a total stranger. The man below, ordinarily 
hospitable, mistook the visitor for a burglar, and before 
the proper explanations could be made pumped him full 
of lead from the ever ready forty-five. 

Sometimes a fit of hunger will overtake one of the 
brethren on the heights above. Absent-mindedly he will 
throw his orange peels into the air in front of him. 
He means no harm, but it may happen that below him 
some one is entertaining guests on his front porch, and 
the bombardment is apt to have a disturbing effect. Such 
things as this are not designed to promote friendly feel- 
ings, but, nevertheless, the citizens of Bisbee seem to be 
on exceedingly cordial relations, a fact for which I have 
not been able properly to account. 

The jitney drivers of Bisbee possess a low and 
vicious cunning. When I stepped off the train on my 
visit to the place I approached one of them. I asked him 
to take me to the Copper Queen Hotel. As the car was 
starting, my curiosity prompted me to inquire the fare. 

"Fifty cents," he answered. I was not surprised, 
for in this country the prices seem to rise with the alti- 
tude. The machine heaved noisily and proceeded fifty 
feet or so up a hill — in this city none of the streets is 
level — and stopped. 

"What's the matter — car busted?" I inquired, sym- 
pathetically. 

"Nope," he answered. "This is the Copper Queen 
Hotel." 

It is not difficult after reaching the hostelry to amuse 
one's self for a considerable length of time in an extreme- 
ly sedentary manner by sitting with the rest of the throng 
on the porch. In front are the brick offices of the Phelps- 



Bishce, the Hidden City 103 

Dodge Mercantile Company, v/ith an incipient park by 
its side. High above it towers the Sacramento Hill. Ly- 
ing on its side, like some huge caterpillar, is a tremendous 
pipe, formerly used in a smelting plant, but not yet re- 
moved. The height is dotted with many prospect holes 
so high up they look like the entrance to some prairie 
dog's abode. 

I had not been there long before a leathery faced 
Mexican passed up the street driving a dozen heavily 
loaded burros. These animals can be bought for any- 
v/here from 5o cents to $7 and are more intelligent than 
the Mexicans that own them. Half an hour after this I 
saw the same man and his entourage winding up the side 
of the hill in front, although how he got there I am unable 
to say. 

I weaned of the porch after a time, however, and 
walked up the main street. It was filled with miners and 
business people. There are fewer Mexicans among the 
number than one is in the habit of seeing along the border. 
The streets are barely wide enough to permit two vehicles 
to pass one another. The sidewalks were designed for 
the express purpose of making the arduous task of the 
pickpocket easier. Half way up the main street, which is 
lined with dingy brick buildings, two or three stories high 
— no adobe is used — a large crowd was gathered. Be- 
fore an innocent restaurant called the English Lunch 
Room a union picket informed all who came within his 
range that ''this is an unfair shop, boys. Ten hours a 
day they work." 

I learned that since the properietor had refused to 
meet the eight-hour demands of his workers, he had lost 
$4,000. One day he tried the expedient of conspicuously 



104 Along the Rio Grande 

carrying a forty-five in his hip pocket when he left with 
his non-union men. He was arrested for carrying con- 
cealed weapons. 

He has since been sitting with waiters for his sole 
company in weaponless splendor. 

In all this bold West there is none who has 
dared the wrath of the union men to eat within. I was 
strongly tempted to do so myself, but after a glance at 
the crowd decided I did not wish to make a Roman holi- 
day for them. 

I asked the pompous picket where he would advise 
eating, and proceeded on my way with his admonition 
that "this is an unfair shop, boys," still ringing in my 
ears. 

In the days of old fire and flood were the biggest 
terrors of the Bisbee inhabitant. The main street would 
sometimes be knee deep in a surging torrent from the 
mountains. If one of the houses on a lower level caught 
afire it was not long before those looking down haughtily 
from above were in the same fix. Now, I was told by 
a long bearded citizen, there is an adequate system of 
fire protection, and well planned drains foil the fury of 
the elements. Mebbe so, but it is my private opinion that 
the fire engines must be modelled on the plan of aero- 
planes to be sufficiently effective and the sewers in the 
rainy season must have much in common with the Bay of 
Fundy when the tide is ebbing. 

One of the picturesque features of a Bisbee fire is 
that if a person trapped on the third floor undertook a 
too enthusiastic jump he would be apt to land a half a 
mile or so below. It would be a long climb back again. 
I saw the charred ruins still standing of a couple of build- 



Bisbee, the Hidden City 105 

ings in the direction of the Warren District. The fire had 
ceased when there was nothing left to burn. 

All of Bisbee's water, for fire and other purposes, is 
piped from the town of Naco, about six miles distant. 

Its elevation of 5,030 feet gives Bisbee certain ad- 
vantages besides an attractive climate. Its principal 
business, of course, is copper mining, and all of the ore 
produced by the Copper Queen and C. & A. mines is put 
in ore cars, which, on account of the elevation, are able 
to coast without engine assistance all of the way to Doug- 
las, over twenty-five miles away. The engine's task of 
pulling them back again is simple, for they are then 
empty. 

Bisbee is theoretically a ''dry" town, but if some 
poor person were to find himself in the street simply un- 
able to endure thirst longer, there would be no real neces- 
sity for him to do so. He need merely say, in a rather 
loud tone of voice to the world in general, ''Gosh, how 
I would like a bottle of beer, or even something stronger," 
and his fiery godmother, in the person of some decrepit 
bootlegger, would appear like magic by his side to guide 
him to some place where he could obtain "a bottle of 
beer or even something stronger." If he disliked being 
dependent upon some one in this fashion and wished to 
get it by his own unaided efforts, he could stroll up the 
street called the Canon and find what he wished at the 
majority of the places to be located there. 

On the same street, which reminds one with its 
disreputable, tumble-down buildings of some foreign city, 
gambling still continues in full swing, just as it did in the 
early days of the mining camp. In any one of the pool- 
rooms or dance halls whose doors remain wide open 



106 Along the Rio Grande 

one can lose his money at everything from faro to roulette 
just as easily as at Monte Carlo. 

The city at night is beautiful, for out of the darkness 
along the sides of the mountain gleam thousands of 
lights that give one the impression that the whole in- 
terior of the hill is lighted and holes had been punched 
in the surface to let the brilliance through. The illumina- 
tion is supplied by nearly 14,000 inhabitants, 23,000, if 
one is including the entire Warren District, embracing Bis- 
bee, Lowell and Warren. The city is still growing, I am 
told on good authority. A few years later I would like 
to return and see where it has grown to. I think when 
that day comes it v/ill have burst its skin. 



CHAPTER XVI. 
Down in Bisbec's Stomach. 

All of Bisbee's past and all of its future are wrapped 
up in mining. Thirty-nine years ago work was first begun 
on copper claims in that district. It has been continued 
feverishly ever since. Were the ore bodies belonging 
to the Copper Queen and the Calumet and Arizona com- 
panies to be exhausted, Bisbee would doubtless heave a 
last gasp of weariness and disappear from the map of 
Arizona as quickly as it was born. More than five thou- 
sand miners would be thrown out of employment and 
twenty thousand inhabitants would have to pull up and 
look elsewhere for a city. 

In August, 1878, Jack Dunn and his partners wan- 
dered into Mule Gulch and staked out a claim which later 
proved to be one of the richest in the country. Later, 
after much litigation between the various mining com- 
panies of the district, it was taken over by the Copper 
Queen Consolidated. Mule Gulch became Bisbee, and the 
name Jack Dunn, as a rule, will bring forth merely a 
blank expression when mentioned to the average Bisbee 
citizen. Ever since the days of Dunn, however, tons of 
ore have been pouring out of the mines yearly and the 
interior of the hills would make an ant blush for his lack 
of industry. Stretching more than five hundred yards up 
the rad side of the hill in which the Southwest claim is 
located can be seen two jagged cracks, about two feet 

107 



108 Alon<^ the Rio Grande 

across, caused by settling resulting from the mining going 
on underneath. They are opening at the rate of an inch 
a month. 

Yet the mind of the Bisbeean concerns itself little 
about how much longer the presence of copper will allow 
him to dwell in Mule Gulch. He will move when the 
time comes; until it does come he will stay in Bisbee. In 
spite of his apathy, however, I decided to visit one of the 
claims, examine it carefully and let the good people know 
about how much longer they might expect to remain. 
If they were caught unprepared after that it would be 
their own fault. 

Harry Anderson, the night foreman of the Copper 
Queen, took me down. I found him in a wooden shack 
near what is called the Czar shaft. He was born in an- 
other mining camp, Leadville, Colorado, and has been 
in the mining business ever since. He gave me some old 
clothes to put on. After I had changed I went over to 
the shaft where the night shift was being taken down 
in the two elevators that came dripping to the surface 
every one or two minutes. Nine of them with their 
lighted carbide lanterns gleaming in their hats above their 
pale faces would crowd into the lift at once and be shot 
down into the depths below. I looked over the sides of 
the shaft, but the darkness within was so intense that after 
they had dropped about twenty feet they were invisible. 

Before long it came our turn and I stepped in after 
Mr. Anderson in the most approved miner style. In an- 
other second I was wondering whether it would be eti- 
quette to ask them to stop to return for my stomach, 
which somehow or other seemed to have been left above. 
An instant later, however, I learned that this would be 



Down in Bisbcc's Stomach 109 

unnecessary, for the elevator halted with a bang and I 
became acutely conscious that my organ had returned. 

My impressions after that point were somewhat 
vague, though turbulent. My most vivid recollections are 
of what had been suggestively termed the ''Rat Hole," 
although it was some time before we reached it. With 
our shoes sucking through the mud, the dim rays of the 
lantern disclosing a narrow dripping tunnel enforced with 
beams, we sloshed along until we came to a couple of 
men having a cozy time in a little side chamber digging 
away the roof. They were making a "raise" to reach the 
ore which lay above the drift of limestone in which we 
found ourselves at that time. 

*'Hello, Harry," said one of them. ''It's workin' a 
bit over in 'H'." 

We crawled down numberless ladders which de- 
scended in a series of fifteen foot flights. I figured that 
we must be 1,200 feet underground. We reached "H" 
at last, where a dirty faced gentleman by the name of 
Jack and his similar faced partner Bill were picking away 
at some reddish looking clay splotched with streaks of 
black. Above their heads the timbers sagged, big, heavy 
things, eight inches square. 

"She's begun to work a little, Harry," they said. 

"If it gets bad leave it and go to some other stope," 
he replied. 

We groped along for another five minutes. Down 
another slimy ladder we crawled, the water trickling down 
my neck like an April rain. 

"1 wish you had time to go over to the Dividend," 
Harry exclaimed, enthusiastically below me. "It's knee 
deep there in water after a rain, and you can get a shower 



110 Along tiie Rio Grande 

bath any time you want." I was glad to hear his voice, 
because he disappeared from sight at each new landing, 
and it was comforting to know that I could reach his ears 
with a lusty cry for help. Even so, it was impossible for 
me to wax ardent about the Dividend or shower baths. 
I was absorbing at that moment all the moisture a person 
not inherently grasping could desire. 

The ladders ceased. We had come to the bottom 
of that particular shaft. At one side the lantern revealed 
an opening almost closed by a beam cracked in the 
middle. 

"This is the 'Rat Hole,* " said my guide. I acknowl- 
edged the introduction. 

"Now, I suppose we'll go back the way we came? " 
I suggested hopefully. He seemed somewhat aggrieved. 

"Why, we haven't been through it yet," he said. 
As if to avoid further argument he squeezed through the 
narrow opening. I sighed and followed. The entire 
roof had sagged and cracked from the weight of the 
mountain above it until it was necessary to crawl along 
on one's hands and knees. Half way through we stopped. 
I was duly grateful, for I was not built for a caterpillar's 
life. I hastily started a conversation to prevent an im- 
mediate resumption of our journey. 

"What does 'workin' ' mean? " I asked. 

"The land gets to sliding," he explained, "and if 
it's bad enough caves in the tunnel and fills it up. Some- 
times we can reinforce the timbers, but mostly we have 
to cut in above it with a raise and strike the ore again 
above it. It catches the boys once in a while, although 
we have far fewer accidents of that kind in the Copper 
Queen than any place else. 



Down in Bishee's Stomach 1 1 1 

*'I remember," he continued, pointing with his thumb 
in a direction that meant nothing to me, *'when we were 
busy over in a stope in the other tunnel I could hear her 
working up above all the time just as if a fine dribble of 
sand were coming down. One of the kids came up to me 
just about that time and told me my little daughter 
had been bitten by a dog and for me to come right home. 
I told the men to look out for the slide and not to remain 
there if it became any worse. I reported it to the super- 
intendent on my way out. When I came back an hour 
later the whole tunnel was down and the men had just 
gotten out a few seconds before. 

"This place here," he said thoughtfully, "will go 
down some time. When we work a tunnel completely 
out we just let 'em go and don't bother about fixing them 
up any more." 

"How long do you think this one will last.?" 1 in- 
quired anxiously. 

"Oh, I don't know," he answered. "They patch 
it up a little once in a while, but if it weren't for that I 
wouldn't give it three weeks." 

I strained back my neck and looked with renewed 
interest at the damp, broken beams above me. Just at 
that moment the ground was shaken by a boom. A few 
seconds later there followed a dull roar, as if tons of earth 
were collapsing. My companion seemed to be unmoved. 
I resolved with an effort to take death as calmly as he. 

After an interval long enough to convince him that 
I was not in the least alarmed I asked in a shakily casual 
voice, "What were those noises? " 

"The first was a blast over in I," he informed. "The 
other was an ore car being dumped into the chute, it's 



113 'Along the Rio Grande 

carried down to the four hundred level and then shot 
underground over to the Sacramento shaft, where all of 
the ore from these different places is taken out." 

We left Rat Hole. I was not sorry. Flashing his 
light as we went on the different kinds of ore we journeyed 
to the Holbrook Shaft. V/e came to some tracks. 

"I want you to see some of the ore cars go by," he 
said excitedly. "We've got some slick ones." We waited 
for several minutes. 

'They never seem to come when I have any visitors 
down here," he said morosely at last. 'They only did 
once — when I had one of the men from the Twenty- 
second Infantry down," he amended. His eyes lit up, as 
nearly as I could judge by the rays of my lantern, with 
reminiscent satisfaction. 

"They came by so fast," he said, "that his eyes 
stuck out like a frog's when he saw them." 

Poor Harry Anderson never had the satisfaction of 
seeing mine perform such acrobatics, however, for after 
waiting ten or fifteen minutes we gave up in despair and 
jumped into the elevator at the Holbrook Shaft. We were 
hoisted once more to the cool night air above. 

As 1 returned back to the hotel I was not able to de- 
termine just what kind of a report should be made to the 
Bisbee citizens. I think, however, that ten or fifteen years 
from now the Copper Queen and the C. & A. will still 
be found in operation. It will not be immediately neces- 
sary for the town to begin packing. 



CHAPTER XVII. 
Nogales, on Both Sides of the Line. 

In Spanish, Nogales means "walnut trees/' By the 
aid of a costly fifty-cent dictionary I learned this before 
1 went there. I had seen so many Statefuls of cactus and 
mesquite, with mountains to hold them down, that I felt 
I should like to revel in the cool shade of the walnut trees 
while gentle zephyrs wafted through my auburn locks. 

But when I arrived there I found no walnuts at all. 
There may be a few, but they are surely kept in safes. 
There are trees — some — but they are of other varieties. 
There is shade — at intervals. I saw a young Mexican, 
with a fortune in ice tied about the middle with a piece 
of string, trying to negotiate the distance between one 
shady spot and another. 

A second evil-natured child of toil engaged him in 
an interesting conversation. A few seconds later a howl 
of dismay told me the first had just become aware that 
his chilly possession had miraculously changed to a pool 
of water. 

I proceeded to the "best" (so-called only because 
the others are worse) hotel. A well-wisher told me he 
had heard a guest had been bitten by a tarantula two days 
before, when he tried to wash his hands. 

"Is there any other place.? " I asked. 

"You'll be lucky if you can get a cot to sleep on," 
he replied heartlessly. 



114 Along the Rio Grande 

I waited for three hours until some one reached 
the limit of human endurance and vacated his room. I 
got it. 

I was soon looking enthusiastically for the tarantula. 
I wished to ask it if it wouldn't please, like a nice, good 
little tarantula, run downstairs and bite the boy in the 
lobby, who seemed to think his popularity was determined 
by the volume of noise he could make and the amount of 
pain he could inflict on the patient bootblack. After that 
I desired the tarantula to nip mommer, whose views 
seemed to be similar to her son's. But I could only find 
flies and bright, intelligent looking bugs with shiny eyes 
(called June bugs here, though they aren't). There were 
also some small persevering insects which 1 was not able 
to identify. None of them were deadly. 

I decided I wouldn't like Nogales, but, as usual, I 
soon discovered I was mistaken. 

The next day things began to appear in a different 
light. 

If the troops had arrived there a few days later I 
would probably have found no city to write about. It 
would have been burned in its infancy, like the ill-fated 
town of Columbus, N. M. Nogales is situated in a valley. 
All about it are beautiful rolling hills of green, which are 
excellent for artistic purposes, but just as valuable for 
military ones. A month before they were lined with Mexi- 
can artillery and machine guns. Feeling at that time was 
intense, and they would doubtless have been used for a 
purpose had not the arrival of 1 1,000 troops of the Cali- 
fornia, Connecticut and Idaho militia and three regiments 
of regulars thrown the fear of God into the worthy gentle- 
men across the line. 



No gales 115 

The atmosphere was once more apparently peace- 
ful, although the occasional sniping, such as that which 
occurred early in August, when Claude Howard, one of 
the American sentries, was shot in the leg, indicated the 
good will was only on the surface. The steady flow of 
Mexicans — old men and v/omen, boys and pretty seno- 
ritas (Nogales is one of the few places that one finds their 
far-famed beauty) — continued from one side to the other. 

The narrov/ main street and its shops that try to lure 
customers within, with signs both Spanish and English, 
were crowded with soldiers in vain search for excitement, 
sombreroed Americans and a host of Mexicans — the latter 
outnumber all the others. There are 5,000 people in 
Nogales, Ariz., and about 3,000 in Nogales, Sonora. 
Slightly more than 1,5 00 of these are Americans. The 
drug stores of Nogales seemed to benefit the most from 
the military flood which poured into the town. 

At all the cigar stands, in stores of any variety, were 
beautiful maidens of Spanish descent, ready and willing 
to shake dice with all comers for anything from a box of 
cigarettes to a house and lot. They would not play for 
money, however, as that would be gambling and naughty. 
It made one feel quite guilty on winning to have one of 
them look with her large luminous brown eyes and say, 
''Oh, senor," with a sad little sigh. The usually heartless 
soldier was so moved that he played again and lost — vi^hich 
was good for the house and promoted friendly feeling. 

The most interesting part of the city, however, is 
the border line. There is a break in the busy Main street 
which had been cleared for the space of about a hundred 
yards with the exception of two sentry boxes and an in- 
ternational post. On the Mexican side to the left were a 



116 Along the Rid Grande 

saloon, a couple of restaurants and a row of adobe houses 
covered with plaster and painted with faded colors. They 
ran up to the foot of a hill on which were several shacks. 
On the right are the red Bank of Sonora and the railroad 
tracks. Two or three Carranza soldiers were usually insight 
serving the same purpose as the Americans on their side. 

Before the Government appropriated the space the 
line was the scene of much more excitement than it is 
now. The open space was filled with a line of saloons 
and gambling places, partly on American and partly on 
Mexican soil. I was told of an incident that took place 
in the most active of them. A cowpuncher wanted by 
Mexican authorities for some breach of etiquette took 
refuge in the American side of the saloon. The police, 
unable to follow him across the boundary, waited for him 
at the only exit, which opened on Sonora. They were 
confident their prey would soon be in their hands. Cer- 
tain friends of the harassed man who heard of his trouble 
came to his rescue, however, by sawing out the side of 
the building facing Arizona and allowing him to step forth 
to safety. 

There was more or less smuggling of a petty nature 
attempted, which kept the two officials on duty ex- 
tremely busy. 

'They go over a few times without being exam- 
ined,'* said one of the inspectors, "and it seems so blamed 
easy for them to get something across that the next trip 
they will try to take a load of 'hop' over that will give 
them a profit of several hundred per cent. But when we 
see a man who we believe hasn't any legitimate business 
passing too frequently, we stop and search him just about 
the time he has loaded himself up." 



l\o gales 117 

Off to the left is a hill three or four hundred feet 
high. On its top I saw a peon wandering aimlessly about. 

''What's he doing up there?" I asked. I thrilled 
with the secret belief that he was a soldier getting the lay 
of the American land. 

''He's a poor greaser," he replied, "that is trying to 
do something to keep his mind off how damn hungry he 
is." It was one of the products of the Carranza regime 
and the constant revolutions from which Mexico has been 
suffering the past years. 

Late in the afternoon I crossed the line with another 
newspaper man to visit Nogales, Sonora. 

Fifty ragged, pinched-faced Mexican men and 
women were gathered about the railroad station. They 
were hterally homeless and sleep there all night. A wav- 
ering blue column of smoke was ascending from a small 
fire on which an aged senora was making a weary attempt 
to cook a filthy tortilla. 

We passed up the street. In a cantina, no longer 
prosperous, for the State of Sonora is "dry," several 
Yaquis were playing a noisy game of pool. iNext door, 
through a spotted vista of flies, four men, more wealthy 
than their neighbors, were reclining luxuriously while 
they received a five dollar haircut. 

The fat proprietress of a curio shop stood in the 
entrance vainly looking for customers. From the win- 
dows of the little, low buildings shrunken mothers leaned 
out to watch their tattered offspring hopping about in the 
street. 

Their park, with its green trees, is quite pretty, but 
in strange contrast to the hundreds of old men and loafers 
seated on the benches. 



118 'Along the Rio Grande 

Further on we stopped to enter a book store. Two 
impertinent young Mexicans waited on us. They had 
reached the mature age of 14 years, when all Mexican 
boys don long trousers and grow mustaches. The burden 
on their lips, combined with their security in being on 
the right side of the line, weighed on their minds heavily. 
While I was looking over some weird "Libros por Mexi- 
canos Ninos," which correspond to our "Tip Top Week- 
lies," and are decorated with vivid pictures of Spanish 
heroes rescuing beautiful senoritas, the two youths — In 
Spanish — made remarks scarcely complimentary to their 
customers. The ability of one to scribble ''Americanos" 
and "gringoes" on a piece of paper seemed to cause much 
amusement. I bought the books and we left. 

Further up in the city the attitude of the people 
became distinctly more hostile. Smiles which we occa- 
sionally saw nearer the United States disappeared; scowls 
took their place. Some stopped and stared at us. An 
inquiry as to the location of the post oflfice, which, al- 
though put in bad Spanish, must have been perfectly in- 
telligible to them, evoked nothing more than a sulky 
shake of the head, until at last we ceased to ask it. 

At the jail, a large brownstone building with barred 
windows, quite imposing in its lowly surroundings, we 
stopped to inquire whether we might return the following 
day to take a photograph of it. The question seemed to 
cause a sort of amazed horror to spread over the face of 
the dusky guard. In order that there might be no mis- 
understanding, he burst into a frenzy of "Noes." As we 
walked away I could see that he was having an excellent 
time jabbering intermittently to himself and to a com- 
panion who had come out from the court yard to join 




Some stopped and stared at 



Nogales 119 

him. There seemed to have been something incredible 
about the request 

Twilight was falling. The sun had disappeared in 
a rose-tinted smother of clouds. Throughout the streets, 
glorifying even the hovels of dirt along them, spread a 
marvelous glow that seemed to come from everywhere 
yet nowhere in particular. 

We strolled slowly back to town. Through the 
open door of a pale green shack we saw a slender, yellow- 
faced boy arise from a rickety bed covered with a patch- 
work quilt. He reached for a guitar hanging on the 
wall. 

Presently we heard his high, wavering voice and 
the plaintive, twanging notes of his instrument. He was 
playing a song which he had doubtless picked up on the 
other side — one to which he had fitted soft Spanish words 
of his own. It was one of which I thought I had begun 
to tire — a belief I found to be mistaken. It was ''Home, 
Sweet Home." As we went on the notes became fainter 
and fainter. First the lower ones became indistinguish- 
able and then the higher were carried to us only at in- 
tervals. We stepped over the American line and listened. 
It had either stopped or was too far away. We could 
hear "Home, Sweet Home" no longer. 

When I first went to Nogales I was alarmed by the 
action of certain of the militia I found parading the street. 
Two of them paused in their saunterings to level an accus- 
ing finger at a hard working Mexican plodding home to 
meet his anxious wife and family awaiting him at home 
his return from work. "Zip Five," cried the taller soldier. 
The workman stared at them in vague surprise and con- 
tinued on his way. I walked toward them. Perhaps they 



120 Along the Rio Grande 

had originated some new method for persecuting their 
darker colored brethren. But they had not gone much 
farther before one pointed excitedly at an American with 
a full beard and cried "Zip 30." I knew that my first 
premise was wrong. If a persecution was under way it 
was not confined to a single race. 

The private on the left gazed eagerly into my face 
as I approached. He looked greatly disappointed. I 
realized that the m.atter was becoming personal. I felt 
I had a right to make some inquiries. 

"Why do I cause you such grief? " I asked. 

"Because you don't wear any whiskers," was his 
somewhat amazing response. 

"I am sorry to have displeased you," I said, "but I 
have always been this way." 

"Oh, it isn't that," he replied kindly, but as one 
who was losing interest in the conversation. "We were 
playing Zip." 

Zip, I learned, is a game. Any number of soldiers 
from two to a company can participate in it, but two 
makes a sportier proposition, according to my informant. 

One proceeds along the street in the usual manner. 
If it is your turn for "zipping" you look carefully at the 
hirsute adornment on the face of the nearest pedestrian 
and say "Zip" with the appropriate number appended 
that the whiskers call for. You are quite a simple person 
if you know not that in the scale of things a mustache 
counts five, whiskers ten, a beard twenty, a beard resting 
comfortably on the wearer's chest thirty, "burnsides" or 
"mudguards," whichever you wish to call them, forty, 
while a beard extending to the waist entitles one to the 
credit of eighty. He who is fortunate enough to run 



Nogales 121 

across a man wearing a fringe extending under his chin 
from ear to ear, a la Horace Greeley, gets one hundred. 
If he is right on the job and alive to his opportunities he 
can quickly shout ''Keno" and win the game. If he mis- 
calls the value he is fined ten points. A person is com- 
pelled to get just 100 or his labors must be repeated. 

The game had become quite popular with the Cali- 
fornia, Idaho and Connecticut troops stationed there and 
it was only late in August that any curb was placed upon 
its growth. It was due entirely to the carelessness of 
a mihtiaman. Absorbed in the fact that he needed only 
five more points to win, he stretched out an excited hand 
toward a senorita and cried, "Zip five." Of course he 
was penalized ten points for miscounting, but this failed 
to appease her escort, who was untutored in the joys of 
Zip. Complications ensued. 

After that it was deemed best by the authorities to 
discourage the progress of ''Zip." Nogales mourned, for 
a deathblow had been struck to what promised to prove 
one of its most popular sports. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 
A Trip Into Zapata Land. 

There are few, if any, men along the border who 
have had a more intimate acquaintance with things Mexi- 
can or more bona fide thrills to the square inch in their 
lives than Jack H. Noonan. If he had cut a notch in the 
handle of his revolver for every man he has killed the 
butt would fall off, yet he has killed them "square," as 
any one who knows him will tell you. Except for his 
dealings with Mexicans, whom he doesn't regard in the 
light of humans, he has never yet done a thing that a 
Westerner would call crooked, although there has been 
many a time when he has evaded what he regards as more 
or less superfluous man-made laws regarding smuggling 
arms to revolutionists in the days when there was no 
danger of their being used to take American lives. 

He has been employed in the secret service of the 
Mexican Government; he organized two revolutions, 
which, if successful, would have resulted in the annexation 
of Lower California to the United States. He has fought 
in numberless battles. He and four others are the only 
white men who have ever gone into the Zapatista country 
and were able to converse about it afterward. Some- 
where down there the others are buried. 

The chances for a person weathering such experi- 
ences as he has had are about one in a million, but Noo- 
nan is one of those persons so constituted that he always 
wriggles out of danger. 

133 



A Trip Into Zapata Land 123 

A friend of his once told me: "I saw Noonan over 
in Juarez one day when feeling against Americans was 
very bitter take away a gun from a drunken Mexican guard 
and slap his face. Some soldiers were standing near by. 
Noonan told them that he didn't intend to be killed by any 
'soused Mexican,' and they did nothing. Ordinarily they 
would not have hesitated a minute in shooting him, but 
his life is charmed. I have implicit faith that Noonan can 
get out of any scrap untouched." 

I met Noonan in a yard in the rear of one of the 
hotels here. He was sitting on a bench which afforded us 
the only refuge from the blistering sun. I joined him 
just as the little tow-headed son of the proprietor came up 
with a demand: "Give me a match, Noony." 

"Noony's" face lit up with a tenderness surprising in 
a "bad" man only until one gets acquainted with them 
and finds out what they are really like. "Watche going 
to do with it, Ben, burn up the hotel? " he asked, hurriedly 
searching out the desired article. Ben didn't tell. Small 
boys always want matches and never explain their pur- 
poses. He grabbed it and rushed off to unknown lands. 

"He's the greatest little kid in town," said Noonan, 
and I agreed with him, although I hardly constituted an 
authority. 

Noonan is a natural story teller. It is rare that one 
who is Irish, and has had such experiences as his, is not. 
As he told me of them they sounded like dime novels, but 
I am convinced they have been not in the least exag- 
gerated. One of his faults is modesty and he left out 
much for fear of appearing conceited. 

He told me of his trip as a spy into the country of 
Zapata, the bandit in Southern Mexico whom neither Car- 



124 Along the Kio Grande 

ranza nor his predecessors have ever been able to con- 
quer. 

"For some time," he began, "during the Huerta 
regime it was thought that ammunition was being sup- 
pHed to Zapata from the Federal garrison at Mexico City. 
General Abraham Gonzales was extremely anxious to find 
out for his chief whether this was the case or not. He 
called me to him one day up in El Paso and put the thing 
to me straight. 

" This is the way the situation stands,' he said. 
'I've already sent five men down into Morelos and none 
of them has ever come back. Maybe you won't if you 
go, but if you want to try it money is no object.' 

"I told him that the 'no object' part sounded pretty 
good to me and I'd do it for $1,000. 

"Well, I hopscotched around El Paso for a few days 
before starting, trying to figure out the best way of going 
about the whole thing, v/hen I ran across a party of four 
men, two of them Germans, talking in a bar about a trip 
into Guerro to take moving pictures. It was a crazy thing 
to attempt, but, if they wanted me to do it, it was none 
of my business. I spoke to one of them and told him I 
had overheard their conversation and would like to chip 
in on the party if they didn't have any objection. They 
said, 'Sure, come ahead,' so the next day we started. 

"We took the train down to a town called Vista and 
from then on we went the rest of the way on horseback. 
After we had ridden four hours through a country without 
a soul in it we came at last to a little hill about 250 feet 
high. Just as we rode over the top a bunch of three 
hundred Zapatistas jumped up out of the brush. They 
told us to throw up our hands. We didn't lose much time 



A Trip Into Zapata Land 125 

about doing it. We were arrested and taken to a little 
adobe prison three miles away and locked in there for 
the night to await the arrival of Zapata himself. 

'The next day we were haled to the headquarters 
of the chief. He was dressed up as if he were the main 
exhibit in the circus. He would have put the sportiest bull 
fighter I have ever seen to shame. He wore a velvet 
suit, a big hat about three feet across, decorated with sil- 
ver ornaments that must have cost three hundred dollars 
if they cost a centavo. He had a long, black, drooping 
mustache and little beady eyes like a snake's. 

"I couldn't speak much Mex at that time and he 
didn't savvy white man's talk, so we had an interpreter. 

"I remember I had four cigars in my pocket. 1 
fished one out and offered it to him. He looked at it 
steady for a long time. Then he crumbled it up and threw 
it on the floor. 

"He turned to the interpreter. Tell the gringo I 
will supply my own smokes,' he said. 

"After that we tried to explain what we were doing 
with the moving picture camera. It was a hard job, for 
they seemed to think that it was some new sort of ma- 
chine gun. When that was done I figured our hash was 
cooked, anyway, so it wouldn't make things much worse 
if I offered the chief another cigar. So I pulled 'em out, 
stuck one in my mouth and offered the other to the old 
toreador. He suspected, I guess, that I was trying to 
poison him or something, because he returned it and told 
me to smoke it myself. I threw the one I had away and 
lit it. He seemed somewhat disappointed when it didn't 
kill me and then informed us that we would know by sun- 
rise what was going to be done with us. We were re- 



126 Along the Rio Grande 

turned to the prison. We were pretty sure we knew what 
sunrise meant for us, so all that night we spent in writing 
letters home, though I don't know how we thought they 
were ever going to get there. 

"When we finished we sat with our elbows on the 
ledge of the one window in the cell and waited for dawn 
to come. I hope it never takes so long again." 

At this point there was another interruption from 
Ben, who seemed to regard "Noony" as a walking com- 
missary department. 

"Noony," he said, " I want five cents." The fortune 
was produced and the boy again vanished. 

"The sun rose and filled our prison with light, but 
we heard from no one for two hours more. At last the 
door opened and we were led out by a guard. Once 
more we were taken before Zapata. He told us that he 
had decided to let us go. Perhaps the cigars had made a 
hit — I didn't know — but he had never spared prisoners 
before. We were told if we ever returned to his country 
again we would be shot without any further investigation 
and then the guard led us out through the courtyard and 
gave us back our horses. 

"On the way out we passed by rows of ammunition 
boxes piled high and 1,700 new rifles in khaki cases. 
There were 340,000 rounds of ammunition and all of 
them had the mark of the Mexico City arsenal, which 
proves that Huerta's suspicions of treason in his garrison 
were correct. 

"I didn't tell my moving picture friends I was a spy 
in the employ of the Mexican Government until we were 
in the train on the way back. I think when I did they 
regretted that Zapata hadn't ordered me shot. 



A Trip Into Zapata Land 127 

"A week later I got my money and on the strength 
of what I had discovered Huerta ordered the execution 
of a colonel, two majors and a captain." 

Ben once more came to the front. 

"Noony," he said, grabbing him by the hand, "1 
want you to come and see somethin' I got." 

"My boss says I got to go," he smiled. "When 1 
see you again I'll tell you about how we nearly won 
Lower California for the United States." 



CHAPTER XIX. 

How Lower California Nearly "Annexed" the United 

States. 

When I next talked with Jack Noonan it was near 
the line dividing the United States from Mexico. He is 
now employed in the law abiding occupation of customs 
inspector and his square, determined chin, steady eye and 
reputation as a person who gets exceedingly impatient 
and disposed to action when trifled with made him an 
excellent man for the position. The fact that he knows 
from past experience if there is any way of getting goods 
(particularly if it be ammunition) across the line unob- 
served is merely an incidental recommendation. 

I saw him after dinner. There was a parade of 
pretty senoritas, their less attractive families and many 
machines filled with Mexicans of every description passing 
to and from Sonora. Occasionally he would stop them, 
look through any suspicious package and allow them to 
go upon their business, which consisted as nearly as I 
was able to judge of merely strolling up and down until 
bedtime on the exceedingly narrow main street of 
Nogales. 

*'How'de.? " he said when I came up. "I said yester- 
day I would tell you about that California stunt, didn't I? " 

I endeavored to convey the impression he had and 
that I was awaiting the full details. 

'That was the nearest I ever came to being a mil- 

128 



Nearly "Annexed" the United States 129 

lionaire," he said reminiscently, as he motioned a car, 
which had stopped on the line, to continue. "If it had 
gone through the way we planned Nogales wouldn't be 
able to hold all the money we would have cleaned up. 

"Our scheme was to take the little town of Mexicale, 
which was the capital. The other burgs would be eas}^ 
once we got possession of that, for recruits would come 
fast when we offered them good wages and they saw 
we were victorious. We v/ould oust Cantu, the Governor 
of Lower California, and put in our own man, Henriquez 
Araya. We had obtained a paper about a block long 
from Carranza that recognized Araya as the official Gov- 
ernor of the State. An election would be the next thing 
in order, the purpose of it being to annex the United 
States, which would insure us protection in there and 
allow us to develop the property which we had gained 
without molestation. It wouldn't really matter whether 
the suffering public of Lower California wished to go 
through with this latter part of the program or not, for 
a commission to count the votes would be appointed by 
Governor Araya. I was to be on it and I guess the other 
members would be able to do just as good counting as 
myself. 

"We were financed by a man in California." He 
told me his name, but I will spare the gentleman the em- 
barrassment of mentioning it. "Just to make sure we 
would have plenty of capital, however, we went to Villa 
and asked him why he had been overlooking a bet like 
Lower California so long. We offered to let him in on 
the game. 

"Villa said it looked reasonable enough to him, and 
gave us $\SyOOO for his share. 



130 Along the Rio Grafide 

"Several weeks before we planned to pull off the 
fracas I went up to Calexico, a little town on the border, 
across from Mexicale, to look over the land and outline 
our plans of operation. At night I would go over to 
Mexicale and learn where Cantu had his men stationed 
and all that stuff. One day while I was over there I ran 
across a fellow named Perrazs, with whom I had had 
some trouble in Nogales. I had grown a full beard and 
was a pretty tough looking work of art, so I didn't make 
a sign. I went back to the other side, hoping he hadn't 
recognized me. 

"He spotted me, though, and went running off to 
Cantu with his information. Cantu knew what my being 
there meant. That night all the lights in the town were 
ordered out, the bells were ringing and the bugles playing 
— you never heard such a racket in all your life. The 
people began to pack up their stuff and hike across the 
border. There were some American troops stationed 
there and they saw something was up, but they didn't 
know what. They figured the town had gone crazy, 1 
guess. 

'The next night I started across to look the cortel 
over again. I was taking a big risk, but I wasn't quite 
sure I had been recognized and there were some things 
I wanted to find out. I had just stepped over the line 
when I heard them begin to scurry around in the arsenal 
for their guns. I didn't wait, but just turned around on 
my heel, as if I hadn't ever intended to go over at all, 
and came back again. 

"Two months later, it was in August a couple of 
years ago, I got word from Araya in Tucson that the 
army was ready — sixty- five of them. In order to account 



Nearly "Annexed^' the United States 131 

for bringing such a big number of men to that place we 
booked them as 'cotton pickers.' 

"They were the sorriest looking bunch of bums 
when they piled off the train that I've laid my eyes on in 
a long weary day. Glass eyes and wooden legs were as 
common as fleas in a Mexican. I was kind of dubious 
about our plan then, but I thought I would go through 
with it anyway. 

"The next night I took them over the line. They 
didn't seem to be too familiar with firearms, so I told 
them to be careful with the guns when they were handed 
out of the cars, for they were loaded. 

"Well, what I was afraid of happened — one of the 
rifles was accidentally discharged and Cantu's men were 
rushing around like lizards the next minute. I ordered 
the men into a ditch and we waited for them. They 
didn't appear until morning, and if we had gone through 
with the attack then I think we might have gotten away 
with it, for after I had learned that Cantu was on to our 
plans I had spread the report we had 600 men, and he 
believed it. But Araya had an idea that he could get 
Cantu to give up without a fight for $5,000 and part of 
the profits. For two days they argued and Cantu was 
willing, but on the second day his father-in-law persuaded 
him not to do it. By that time he had learned the real 
size of our outfit, so when he led a charge against us the 
next day I knew there wasn't much chance. 

"I looked back to the United States line and saw 
the troops lined up there to arrest us if we retreated, so 
I knew the only thing we could do was to fight. 

"I told the men not to fire until I did. I waited 
until Cantu, whom I spotted because there were a couple 



132 Along the Rio Grande 

of buglers by his side, had gotten as close as I dared let 
him come. I drew a bead on him and fired. I missed. 
Then it started all along the line. They had two machine 
guns dragged by mules. They v/heeled the old animals 
around and then cut loose. The bullets were flying so 
thick and fast that we could hardly stick our heads over 
the trenches without being hit. We killed three and 
wounded four. None of us were touched. 

"After a while Cantu withdrew his men and spread 
them out fan shape. I saw we were goners. I told the 
men they had better try and get out of it the best way 
they could. Araya and I escaped by a miracle. We 
jumped into an arroya, knee deep in blue mud that ran 
near our ditch and crawled along on our bellies right 
through Cantu's army without their seeing us. Once in 
back we went 'way down below and crossed over into 
the United States quite a distance beyond Calexico. 

'That night we took refuge in a little inn there. In 
the morning the proprietor came to us and said there was 
a big gang of men outside that wanted to see us. It was 
our army, all covered with dirt and mud. They were 
after their pay. How they had survived I don't know. 

" 'I guess we had better give it to them,' Araya said, 
so we lined them all up in the rooms and paid them off 
with the money Villa had given us. 

"After they had left, the proprietor came to me and 
asked if I had had anything to do with the racket across 
the line the night before. 

" *Of course not,' I told him. 'Now here's fifty 
dollars. You don't know anything about it.' His memory 
proved bad. 

"The next day nine of our men were arrested for 



'■"' Nearly "Annexed'' the United States 133 

passing counterfeit money. Carranza had doubled crossed 
Villa, Villa had double crossed Carranza, we had planned 
to double cross Villa and Carranza both by turning over 
Lower California to the United States when we got it, and 
Villa had double crossed us by giving us that $15,000 in 
bogus money — it was a double cross game all around. 

*'We had everything fixed right the second time we 
tried it, but the Government found out just fifteen hours 
too soon. We still had Carranza's authorization of 
Araya as Governor and we had learned by experience; 
our plans were worked out down to the smallest detail. 

"We intended to enter at a little town near Mexicale, 
eighteen miles west of Yuma. We had five hundred men 
working on a ranch, all of whom were ready to fight for 
us when we needed them, and they were all handy men 
with the guns. 

''I was going to bring them into the town in day 
coaches. They were to lie on the bottom, so the cars 
would look like empties until the guards came up to in- 
spect them. Then we would bump them off and hop- 
scotch over to the cortel, which we would take. I knew 
where the commandante lived who had the key so we 
could get all the ammunition there. Next I would grab 
one of the machine guns and take it to the top of the 
tallest building, which I had picked out, and turn it loose. 
When those natives heard it ripping away there wouldn't 
be much left to do. The biggest part of taking Lower 
California is getting one town. The rest is easy. I don't 
see how we could have slipped up this trip, but just before 
we were ready to go in I heard that the Government 
agents had found out about it and were after us for breach 
of neutrality. 



134 Along the Rio Grande 

"I jumped on a train and didn't stop until I hit San 
Antonio." 

He pulled out his watch. It was nearly 9 o'clock. 

"I've got to chase along up the border now," he 
said, "and see what's going on up there." He sighed as 
he left. 

"Araya and I met several times after that. We 
always joked about how nearly we added on a big chunk 
of land to the United States, but when I think how near 
we all came to being millionaires it makes me feel kind 
of seasick." 



CHAPTER XX. 
More of Jack Noonan. 

"There was a time," said Jack Noonan, quondam, 
filibuster and revolutionist, "when I couldn't sit down with 
a fellow and do nothing but talk like this. I had to be 
hopscotchin' around in some trouble or another all the 
while." He was perched, when he spoke, in what I would 
have called an extremely uncomfortable position on the 
arm of a chair in the lobby of the Montezuma Hotel. 
His ever present cigar protruded upward at a rakish angle 
from his mouth dangerously near his brown felt hat, which 
was pulled down over his eyes. 

"I'm only fifty," (if he had been a woman I could 
have truthfully told him he only looked forty, although 
I said nothing as it was), "but I've led a pretty strenuous 
life taken one way and another. I'm beginning to feel 
it some." 

I, too, was balanced on the arm of a chair and began 
to feel decidedly cramped, but I maintained a discreet, 
immobile silence, for I knew that when Noonan was 
started on his personal reminiscences he liked to ramble 
on in his own way. Questions did not bring the expected 
results, nor did uneasy shiftings about in one's chair. 

"I guess the time I came nearest to getting my 
'come-upents' was when I smuggled the flying machine 
over to Mexico for old Governor Jose Maytorena when 
Madero was in power. They had already tried to get the 
blame thing over, but the authorities nabbed it and placed 

135 



136 Along the Rio Grande 

it under guard of a marshal at Tucson. Maytorena sent 
for me. He told me there was $2,500 and expenses for 
me if I smuggled it into Mexico. 

"I knew I could get the marshal at Tucson for about 
fifty cents and a couple of cigars, so I told the Governor 
he was on. 

"I hired a machine and went up there. I promised 
the marshal that Madero would make him a general in 
the army and give him $300 besides. He agreed to take 
the aeroplane out with me. 

"We hadn't been gone more than an hour when 
the troops were after us in two other autos. We traveled 
some, but just when we got to Nogales, a little ways 
from the line, our gas wagon broke down. We barely 
had time to shove her across before the men chasing us 
came up, a little too late for them to do anything except 
swear at us. I told Maytorena I had promised the driver 
$25o, and of the deal I made with the marshal. He fixed 
them up. 

"A little while later Maytorena sent for me to bring 
some machine guns across that had been left in a little 
back alley in Nogales, close to the hne. 

"We worked all night on them. At 12 o'clock 
another shift of Yaqui guards was put on that hadn't 
been told about me. I came over with one of the guns, 
and two of them became quite enthusiastic about the 
prospect of shooting me. Fortunately, the captain, hear- 
ing the disturbance, came running up and told them who 
I was. He thereupon proceeded to beat them up, al- 
though it was really not their fault. 

"In the morning one of the American guards said to 
me, *Noonan, do you know, I think there was something 



More of Jack Noonan 137 

goin^ on along the line last night I heard the deuce of 
a racket down there.* 

"I pulled my best look of astonishment and told 
him I thought he must be wrong, but he wagged his head 
and replied, 'Don't tell me. I've been at this game 
too long not to know when there's something phoney 
under way.' 

*'Some time before this I was in El Paso with a 
Captain Tillwell of the English army. We needed money 
bad. I had twenty-five cents besides my clothes, and 
added to what he could muster up our combined wealth 
was four bits. 

*' 'Noonan,' said Tillwell, 'I hear tell of a revolution 
by a chap named Madero. What's the matter with lend- 
ing him a helping hand?' 

" 'I don't find any flaw in it,' I replied. We went 
off to hunt up Gonzales, who was in the back room of a 
little El Paso saloon. 

"We told him that we would like to join his army 
as officers. He asked us what we knew about fighting. 

" 'My friend here has been a captain in the English 
army for six years,' I replied with a sufficient amount of 
truth. 'I've been a lieutenant in the American for three 
years and in the English for four,' I added with less. 

"'Fine,' he responded. 'Come back again at 10 
o'clock and we'll take you.' I explained to him that we 
needed something to eat with, and he looked rather 
surprised, but gave us some money. 

"When we returned later we were all piled into 
machines and taken to Guadalupe. Madero was along, 
but he didn't cross over with us. Neither the captain nor 
myself had seen him before. Tillwell gave him the once 



138 Along the Rio Grande 

over — Madero was a small, short fellow — and whispered 
to me, 'Hey, I don't think much of this little insignificant 
guy. What right's he got to have a revolution all to 
himself?' 

"He wasn't much to look at, but during the years 
after that I got to know and like him real well. He 
took a fancy to me for some reason or other, and he felt 
that I was about the only person he could trust. Later, 
down in Mexico City, I used to go up to his room by a 
back way, when he had generals and things waiting out- 
side to see him. He would pull out a box of cigars and 
say, 'Now, let's talk.' 

"Well, anyway, we crossed over the line up at 
Guadalupe and made ready to move on Juarez. There 
was some excitement caused by a duck hunter on the 
Rio Grande whose gunshots we took to be those of the 
Federalists. We found out what it was after a while 
and proceeded on our way. 

"Soon up in the hills we saw an army. Again we 
didn't know who it might be, and there was a great deal 
of excitement among our men. It was Villa, but each 
of us thought the other an enemy until after about an 
hour of skirmishing we managed to get together. We 
proceeded in a bunch to Juarez and the battle began. 

"After we had been firing for about half an hour 
a man came out on a snowy horse carrying a white flag, 
with instructions from Madero to tell us to cease fighting. 
Madero had some crazy notion of getting the town to 
surrender without bloodshed, but there were about forty- 
five Americans in our crowd and none of us intended to 
stop them. Next to me was a crack shot. When he 
saw the messenger he raised up and shouted to me that he 



More of Jack Noonan 139 

would shoot the flag out of the man's hand. He fired 
and missed. He didn't kill him, as has been sometimes 
said, but his bullet whistled so close to the flag bearer's 
head that he dropped off his horse and returned to Madero 
with the report that nothing could be done with the 
Americanos — they were bent on going into the city. 

"After a while we entered the city. Gonzales came 
up with another command from Madero that if we didn't 
obey he would have us all executed. We told Gonzales to 
go back and inform Madero if he didn't behave himself we 
wouldn't let him into our city at all after we captured it. 
The general said he would make an attempt to patch 
things up with his commander. He succeeded, but we 
really didn't care whether Madero liked what we were 
doing or not. 

"We worked our way into a trench about five hun- 
dred yards from the jail. Those guarding it were so 
astounded at our foolhardiness when they saw us that 
they believed at first we had come to surrender. They 
ran up a little white flag and soon a Mexican came out 
to find out whether we intended to keep on fighting. 
We told him we most certainly did. He returned, and 
they opened up on us with the machine guns. 

"While we were besieging the^j ii 1 observed that 
there was a lad about six feet fou*- wearing heavy glasses, 
making apparently suicidal trips fvom Ihe jail to a well 
and back again with water. He ^lOst have done it at 
least sixty times. He looked like an American, so we 
tried to keep our fire away from him, yet it was a miracle 
that he survived. 

"On the roof I saw a Mexican, standing up near 
one corner, slowly and deliberately raising his rifle and 



140 Alons: tht: Rio Grmide 



killing a man v/ith every shot. I tried three times to 
get him, but the wind or something deflected my bullet 
and I missed. Then Bill Anderson, next to me, said: 
'Watch me get him.' He fired once with no effect. It 
was a long distance, but he was rather peeved. 'I'm 
going to hit him right between the eyes this trip,' he said, 
and took another crack at him. The Mexican pitched 
forward ofif the top of the roof to the ground below. 
When I looked at him later there was a bullet hole right 
where Anderson had said. 

"Pretty soon they ran out a white flag as big as 
a house. 

" 'Well,' I said, turning to Anderson, 'it looks like 
the real thing this time.' 

"We went in and the men were all standing there 
waiting for us v/ith their chests bared expecting to be 
executed according to the usual Mexican fashion. We 
took them prisoners instead and then v/ent to the cells 
to turn the others loose. 

"When I came up to the jail a man shouted through 
the bars: 'For God's sake don't fire in here. I'm an 
American.' He was the son of a Pittsburg m.ulti-million- 
aire and had been arrested the day before for taking 
pictures in Juarez. It had been this fellow that had been 
rushing the water. They had given him the choice, he 
said, of either being shot by them or run the risk of 
being killed outside while he was carrying the buckets 
from the well, about fifty yards from the prison. He 
didn't think there was a chance in a miUion of his not 
being punctured if he did the latter, but there was no 
doubt at all in his mind as to his fate if he refused, so 
lie had taken his choice of the two evils. I guess he has 



More of Jack Noonan 141 

told his experiences back in Pittsburg a million times since, 
if he has told them once. 

"We couldn't find the key to the prison, so we dyna- 
mited the door open and released all that were inside. 

"That about ended it all, but Juarez was certainly 
a wonderful looking sight when we got through with it. 
All the windows of the houses were broken. The dwell- 
ings themselves were looted. Bells were ringing and 
dead horses lying everywhere in the streets. 

"That ended the fight. I didn't have much to do 
afterward until Huerta hired me to blow up the railroad 
tracks in back of Juarez in order that he might cut oflF 
Orosco and capture him. His agent promised me ;^3,000 
and $6.50 per for the thirty days we figured it would 
take us. I took Dan Mahoney and a couple of other 
men along with me and we each carried twenty-five 
pounds of dynamite on our backs. We knew the hills 
better than we did our own grandmothers, and we had the 
best Qf horses. Whenever Orosco's men attacked us we 
took to the hills and didn't have much trouble in getting 
away from them, although the job wasn't exactly as 
peaceful as a prayer meeting. 

"When we returned we met Huerta's agent in a 
room in El Paso. We had done a mighty thorough job, 
but it had taken us only twenty-four days. The agent 
wanted to double-cross us by saying our contract had 
called for a full month's work, and he wouldn't pay us. 
My men were wild and wanted to kill him right then and 
there, but Dan Mahoney, who was calmer than the rest, 
persuaded them not to. Finally we did receive a little 
from him. I was handed $2So to gti out of El Paso to 
Nogales, but it was a long ways from being $3,000. 



142 Along the Rio Grande 

"After we had gone out into the street the boys 
kept stopping to talk with every one they met, and I 
got impatient and went on ahead. I figured we'd better 
hike out of town as soon as we could. I got about a 
block away when I looked back and saw that the whole 
bunch had been pinched by Government agents right 
after I had left them." 

He stopped and puffed a moment on his cigar. I 
cautiously slid off the arm of the chair into a less un- 
comfortable position. 

"I never told you about the time I got pinched across 
the line in Nogales, Sonora, did I ? " he asked after a 
moment. 

I shook my head. 

''Well," he continued, "Governor Maytorena got to 
thinking it over and decided that I knew too much about 
his transactions. I was the only person that had any 
proofs in connection with all the smuggling and other 
shady transactions he had been conducting and he decided 
I would be better out of the way. One day when I was 
in Nogales, Sonora, he slapped me in jail. 

"That night the jailer and two Yaqui guards came 
to tell me that I was to be shot at sunrise. I knew 
the jailer well, and I didn't think he would pull off a 
stunt like that, but at 12 o'clock back they came. On 
the floor outside they dropped the pick and shovel with 
which I was to dig my own grave. It looked bad for me 
then, for not a word of explanation did I receive. About 
3 o'clock, though, the jailer and the guards returned and 
I was taken before Maytorena. He was full of apologies 
and told me the whole thing was a mistake. The next 
morning I found out that my friend the jailer had sent 



More of Jack Noonan 143 

word to Madero in some way and the President had wired 
that he wouldn't hear of my execution. The jailer had 
been able to say nothing to me because of the Yaqui 
guards. 

"I knew Maytorena was lying to me when he said 
it was an error, but he was so smooth about it that I 
shook hands with the slob and left for my home. I was 
a sad looking object, and I slipped into my place without 
seeing any one. 

'The Shriners, of which I am a member, heard of 
my arrest and organized a search party. They went to 
Maytorena and demanded my release, but he told them 
I had already gone. They thought it was a stall, however, 
and all the rest of the night they were looking for me in 
the jail, the graves and every other conceivable place. 
They found me in the morning in my bed." 

Mr. Noonan looked at his watch and with an agihty 
that belied the 3^ears to which he confessed jumped off 
of his chair. 

**Holy Mackerel!" he exclaimed. "I've got to be 
hopscotching back to the line," 



CHAPTER XXL 
The Man Who Knew Mexico Well. 

In the back of the Hotel Montezuma, in Nogales, 
Arizona, was a courtyard. It was not a thing of beauty. 
On two sides any breeze was effectually shut off by the 
hotel itself. A little further away on the left workmen 
made a merry noise on a new roof being erected over 
an "open air" motion picture theatre. A few hundred 
yards in back of a high fence ahead loomed a hill, along 
the bottom of which were layers of Mexican huts. But 
there was shade there supplied by a Cottonwood tree, 
which is something, and a bench whereon one could re- 
cline during "the deadly heat of the midday sun," about 
which the militia have been writing home to their families, 
which was something more, so ever and anon during my 
sojourn in the border city I hied me there for a rest. 

Early one afternoon when my siesta was well under 
way I was dimly conscious of being poked on the shoulder. 
I had a sleepy, though not very logical idea that it was 
the goat which I had seen wandering around the premises, 
so I paid no attention. The boring continued. I opened 
one eye slowly. On the border it takes only eight days 
to reach the point when everything is done slowly. I 
saw a hand as big as a ham with a forefinger outstretched, 
ready to begin another nudge. I opened the other eye 
to see if it were really correct that a hand could be so 
large, and then looked up to find a person at least six 

144 



Man Who Knew Mexico Well 145 

feet four towering above me. He had on a fawn colored 
sombrero, but it was the only thing about him resembling 
a fawn. He resembled a good deal the late John Bunny. 

"1 didn't mean to wake you up," he said, "but I 
heard you were going av/ay." If he really had intended 
to arouse me I suppose he would have picked me and the 
bench up bodily and dropped us until he had had the 
desired effect. 

"Never mind," I said. "I am awake now." 

"My name," he added, giving his suspender a snap 
that sounded like the beginning of a twenty-one gun sa- 
lute, "is H. E. Stewart. The 'H.' stands for Henry." 

"Father's and mother's names and dates of their 
births? " I was inclined to ask, for I wished to resume my 
slumbers, but as he apparently weighed three hundred 
pounds without his shoes on I changed it to "Glad to 
meet you." 

"You're from New York," he said, "and that's where 
all the money is, so I wants to ask you about this." He 
fumbled in his pocket and drew forth three slips of 
paper somewhat the worse from sweat and dirt, upon 
which there were lead pencil scrawls. 

"Wanted," read the first, "To find sumone who 
wants to put money in mexican mines i will do it for him. 
i know mexico well." 

1 turned hastily to the next. "Wanted sumone to 
invest capital in mexican mines i know mexico well." 

On the third he had evidently spent more effort. 
"Wanted," it said, "Sumone who wants to invest money 
in mexican mines i know some good ones both nntemony 
and silver, i know mexico well, will go in as soon as 
things is settled up." 



T46 'Along the Rio Grafide 

He looked at me hopefully. "Which do you think 
is the best? " he asked. 

It was a difficult question to answer, and I was so 
pleased at my reply that for a short while afterward I 
didn't hear what he said. 

"It's hard to tell," I replied. "They would all attrr.ct 
attention." 

When I next became aware of what he was saying 
I realized that he was putting a question to me. "You 
noticed," he inquired, "that I say I know Mexico well 
in all those ads? " 

"You certainly did," I assured him. 

"Well, maybe you think I don't," he answered, 
seating himself on the bench beside me, "but I do. I 
guess I've lost as much money in there as anybody in 
Nogales. I dropped ;^60,000 in an antimony mine be- 
cause I was chased out by this trouble. And I kissed 
$47,000 more good-by in a perjury case." The "per- 
jury case," I ascertained, was one in which some Mexi- 
cans, with the usual Mexican enthusiasm for such things, 
had committed perjury in order to defraud my large friend 
of mines which were rightfully his. 

"You should have found out something about it 
after all that," I replied, wondering how long it would 
be before I was allowed to return to my sleep. "What 
did you discover that no one else knows?" I hoped 
by this strategy to limit the length of his conversation, 
but I erred grievously. I staggered him, but he came 
right back with both hands almost immediately. 

"Yes," he said, "I've seen ten thousand Yaqui In- 
dians near the town of Meadno, on the Yaqui River, 
holding a religious fiesta. I found out all about their 



Mail Who Knew Mexico IVdl 147 

form of worship. It's some sight, I'll tell you. I knew 
them pretty well and they let me watch it. It was taught 
them by the Jesuit priests four hundred years ago and 
is a kind of pageant that lasts for sixteen days. 

"Half of the women wore blue tapas, which are 
a form of shawl, and the rest of them gray ones. They 
made a circle in which were six great wooden crosses, 
and at each one of them in turn a chief with a lion's 
head and another v/ith a cow's head knelt and played 
mournful tunes. Both chiefs carried a wooden dagger 
and sword. They wiped the sword on their heads and 
then were able to control the people by them." 

"What did they have on their heads that enabled 
them to do that?" I queried. 

"Nothing — just superstition. The wiping part was 
only in the ceremony. There were four runners that 
ran around the circle for ten or twelve days in a sort 
of relay race. In the center was a big tomb made out 
of mesquite timber and by its side was a wax figure 
six feet high of the Virgin Mary. The tomb was more 
than 400 years old and in perfect condition. The figure 
of Virgin Mary was about the same age, having been 
given them by the priests long ago, but it was a little 
more weather worn." I almost lost the thread of the 
story in watching him perspire. He was the most ac- 
complished person in this department I have ever seen. 

"All of this was held in the open until they pulled 
off the resurrection of Christ, and for this they hiked 
over to the church carrying the tomb and the figure of 
Mary. Christ was represented by another wax image 
contained in the tomb, and it took eight men to lift the 
lid when the resurrection was held." He stopped and 



148 " Along the Rio Grande 

looked at me. "Ever hear tell of that before?" he 
asked. I was forced to admit that it was all news to me. 

"Well, anyway, it makes no difference," he an- 
swered, "for that wasn't what I came to see you about. 
You're going back to New York and I wanted your 
advice about having one of these ads put in a New 
York paper for about a dollar. I want to get some 
Eastern capital interested in me." 

I think I convinced him after a v/hile that a dollar 
advertisement at the present time in New York would 
not be as valuable as one later, when Mexico was in a 
less disturbed condition. 

"I'll tell you," he said. "Write me v/hen you dope 
it out as the right time and I'll send you the money. 
I'll have time then to fix up a new and longer ad." 

He mopped his face once more, stooped slightly as 
he went through the rear door of the Montezuma and 
disappeared from view. 



CHAPTER XXII. 
Wai the Militia Survive? 

It is quite possible, as a recruit at McAllen had con- 
fided to me, that after the present Mexican difficulties 
have been solved the United States will arouse itself, 
rub its drowsy eyes and look for its fine body of militia, 
only to discover that it has strangely shrunk to but a 
slender remnant of its former self. 

**How many men down here do you think will 
re-enlist, after they've been through these experiences?" 
the embyro soldier demanded of me fiercely, although 
I tried vainly to figure how I could in any way be held 
responsible for their hardships. He waited for no reply. 
He claimed the privilege of answering his own questions 
himself. 

"Hardly a single one. We didn't come down here 
to dig ditches, nor to be day laborers nor policemen. 
We have businesses at home that are suffering by our 
absence and it doesn't help at all to realize we are now 
held solely for patrol work which should be done by 
the regular army. When we joined the militia we did 
so with the understanding that we would not be called 
out of the State except in a national crisis, and only 
during that crisis. We didn't kick when the Mexican 
proposition looked bad, but we do kick when we are 
retained long after there seems to be any necessity for 
it. We didn't sign up with the idea of becoming a first 
line of defense, and the conditions under which we were 

149 



150 Alono; the Rio Grande 

mustered into the Federal service were unfair. It was 
framed so that if a fellow refused to take the oath 
he was publicly disgraced, and many of us came against 
our v/ill, just on that account. The New Jersey troops 
vv^ere mustered in at Sea Girt. Anybody who didn't 
wish to take the oath was told to step out of the ranks, 
strip off his uniform and go home. All the clothes they 
had with them were the ones they wore, so if they 
had taken advantage of this kindly offer they would 
have been forced to do so in their B. V. D.'s. In other 
troops crosses were shaved on the heads of those with- 
drawing." 

"How about getting new recruits to take the place 
of those who apply for their discharge? " I asked. 

'The only way the militia is recruited," he snorted, 
"is by members of it persuading their friends to join, 
and there'll be a fat lot of persuading done when we 
get home — I don't think." 

I was not overly surprised by these sentiments ex- 
pressed in such a radical fashion, for further west along 
the border I had heard the same thing, although not 
quite so universally as at McAllen. The regiments con- 
taining the greater percentage of successful business men 
are, as is natural, the most anxious to return home, but 
even in the others I had listened to the same complaints, 
for it is difficult to snatch a person out of civilian life, 
turn him into a soldier and make him like it. 

This attitude of the men constituting the National 
Guard, however, is not the only reason for its probable 
downfall. The entire mobilization tended to prove that 
the State militia system is fatally weak. Soldiering 
is a business and it is one that requires the entire and 




•'^iJ.<./ 'run;-- "-U , ^^ 




Will the Militia Survive f 151 

constant attention of the person expecting to follow 
it. Drilling one night a week or two in an armory, 
camping out for two weeks in the Summer with high- 
priced cooks furnishing the meals and other features 
non-conformant with regulations, while the rest of the 
time is spent softening up in an office is not the wa}^ to 
produce an army ready to respond at an instant's notice 
to its country's call. When it does answer its value is 
problematical. At Columbus a New Mexican regiment, 
one of the first to be assembled on the border, was 
examined shortly after its arrival. Forty per cent, were 
found unfit. In the Illinois contingent, which numbered 
14,312, there were 1,093 who did not come up to the 
required standard. This was considered to be an average 
showing. 

Many of the officers are political appointees and 
are inefficient. The militia is bound hand and foot in 
red tape, far more so than the regular army. Orders 
given one day are countermanded the next, and the effort 
to conduct things in a thoroughly military fashion makes 
things more confused than ever. 

The militia system has proved- also to be inelastic. 
It has been extremely difficult to recruit suddenly from 
peace to war strength, and maay men had been held in 
camp because their regiments were unable to obtain the 
required number of men. 

Germany declared war on Russia on August 1, 
1914, and the next day at six o'clock her regular army 
was in Luxemburg, at noon of the same day in France 
and on August 4 in Belgium. In six days she had l,85o,- 
000 men in the field. President Wilson issued on July 
18 the order for the mobilization of the troops on the 



16^ Along the Rio Grande 

border. Six days afterward there were less than 29,000 
out of a war strength total of 128,000. Figures sup- 
plied by ex-Secretary of War Stimson show that only 
44 per cent, of these had as much as 100 hours' training. 
Three weeks afterward, on July 9, there were 46,000 
men either on their way to the border or actually there 
from the Eastern Department, which forms 70 per cent, 
of the entire National Guard. There was much confu- 
sion resultant in their equipm.ent, and some had no equip- 
ment at all. On July 12 Washington announced that 
in three weeks it had been necessary to spend $14,300,- 
000 for clothing and supplies, an equivalent of ^100 per 
man for an army of 143,000. A large portion of this 
equipment had to be bought in the open market at war 
prices. 

But when all this money had been expended and 
all these men reached the border we still didn't have 
an arm}^ A year's hard training — harder than the ma- 
jority of them were receiving — would at least be neces- 
sary to render them efficient. 

One of the young men on the border broached the 
idea to me that the whole purpose of this mobilization 
was to break down the National Guard and build up 
the regular army. I doubt if his suspicions are correct, 
but I should not wonder in the least if the same result 
was nevertheless obtained. The army is no place for 
a married man, and it is no place for a man already fol- 
lowing another line of employment, and of these the 
mihtia is composed. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 
The Silent (?) Drama at McAllen. 

Three things — possibly more — were impressed upon 
me by the motion picture performance I saw at McAllen 
with several members of the Seventh Regiment — that 
the slowness with which the average mortal grasps op- 
portunity is remarkable; in spite of its complaints about 
the food, hospitals and other minor diflficulties, the mili- 
tiaman really possesses a sense of humor which one is 
inclined to doubt when he hears him converse about 
these subjects and that there are certain pleasurable sides 
to his life on the border to which his overweening desire 
to return home blinds him. 

He will frequently look back on them in future days 
and tell the one nearest him of the fine time he had during 
his days in Texas. 

It wasn't until the troops had been at McAllen for 
almost a month that it even occurred to our enterprising 
citizens there were possibilities in the silent drama as a 
money maker at this particular point. Then they 
erected an extremely weatherworn tent near the Seventh, 
brought in some equally weatherworn films, streaked with 
dirt and grease, and proceeded to gather in the gold — 
lots of it They doubtless could have made a great 
deal more if they had exhibited features under the age 
limit, but they considered it advisable to cut every ex- 
pense in such a daring enterprise to the bone and acted 

153 



154 Along the Rio Grande 

accordingly. Emboldened by their success, another open 
air theatre was erected near them, so that soon McAllen 
possessed two places of entertainment. 

In the early part of August a storm came and tore 
to shreds the big tent which covered the large amount of 
supplies which they kept without the entrance to pamper 
the appetites of men unable to endure the long picture 
performance without occasional nourishment. In the 
latter part of August another zephyr of eighty miles an 
hour visited the locality, knocked down the shreds and 
added to the general wreckage of the fence which sur- 
rounded the wooden seats. With true Southern leisureli- 
ness, both shreds and fence, however, v/ere once more 
raised. The shadowed actors again held forth nightly 
that soldiers might forget their cares in the mysteries of 
the pictured mazes. 

The enlisted man, particularly if he be a private, 
spends about one-half of his time taking orders — the 
other half is occupied thinking about and cursing them. 
Motion pictures aflford him the finest kind of an oppor- 
tunity for an outlet to his feelings. They enable him to 
issue commands of the most stringent kind to the actors 
on the screen, and there isn't a single chance for them to 
answer him back, nor any danger of his being court- 
martialed. 

Owing to the profusion of orders breaking the still- 
ness of the night I wasn't quite sure when I entered 
whether I had intruded upon a drill of the awkward squad 
or an insane asylum. The hero and the heroine were 
engaged in a love scene. The only reason whatever 
for the continuance of the show from then on was that 
the actors were without substance. The commotion was 



The Silent {?) Drama at McAlUn 165 

worse than at a musical comedy on the night of a foot- 
ball victory at New Haven. Loud sounds of kissing arose 
on all sides. 

•''Steady, men, steady," advised the owner of a bull- 
like voice, who evidently feared that the emotions of 
his comrades would get the best of them at this touching 
scene. Another, who disliked the proximity of the two 
lovers, kept demanding they remain separated by the 
customary military distance, forty inches. There were 
others to whom it brought back sweet memories of that 
almost forgotten city. New York, and they urs:ed the 
repetition of the osculation in the cadence to which they 
had listened so many times in drill — "One, two, three, 
four." 

There is no doubt about it — the villain I saw on 
the screen that night was a hound, one of the drinking 
kind. Even if I had failed to have it impressed upon 
me by the film itself I could not have been mistaken 
after I had heard the comments made upon him by 
members of the National Guard. His drinking settled it. 

"Put him in the guardhouse, he's been drinking," 
some one bellowed, but others suggested far more cruel 
punishment, varying from being assigned to the cook 
or mule details or being forced to do sentry duty the 
following week. 

The poor man, for after all he was only an em- 
bezzler and not worse than most villains, paid no atten- 
tion to their enmity. In the end he suffered for it. After 
taking refuge in a beer cellar, where several expressed 
a longing to accompany him, the detective hero came 
along hot on his trail. The audience cri?d out to him, 
informing him just where the villain was hiding, so he 



156 Along the Rio Grande 

had little excuse to be taken unawares when a bullet 
was fired upon him on his way down the cellar stairs. 
Of course, the leading lady had to mix into it in spite 
of much advice from the spectators. She, too, soon 
learned that the intelligence of her well wishers was far 
above par. The next minute she stopped a large piece 
of lead from the gun of the bank embezzler. To be sure, 
she recovered, the detective overcame his foe and every- 
thing ended happily, but oh, what a great deal of trouble 
they could have been saved if they had only listened 
to the militiamen as attentively as I did. 

Sub-titles were read by self-appointed volunteers 
with loud and painstaking care, and the appropriate fal- 
setto was used when the words were those of a woman. 
It was entirely unnecessary for the men in the back seats 
to strain their eyes. 

A news film showing a group of Warden Osborne's 
convicts was flashed upon the screen at the conclusion 
of the feature. Loud moans arose, in which the bitterness 
could not be mistaken. 

"Lucky dogs!" a young fellow near me exclaimed. 
'They knozv when they're going home." 

Just before the soldiers began to file out to return 
to their camps I looked at the inky sky above, punctured 
with a million dazzling peepholes into heaven. It's dif- 
ferent than it is in New York. One misses the familiar 
constellations that have been pointed to them since child- 
hood. Distance has sunk the Big Dipper into the horizon 
to make room for other and brighter figures, and through 
them all sweeps the luminous Milky Way so much plainer 
than we are accustomed to seeing it in the North that 
it is sometimes not until several nights after their arrival 



The Silent (?) Drama at Mc Allen 157 

that new recruits are able to convince themselves it Is 
not a path of bright clouds. Every once in a while a 
gleaming meteor sweeps across the skies and loses itself 
In the throng. 

Those on the border didn't know then when they 
would be in their homes once more, but some time — per- 
haps not long — they would. It will not be many eve- 
nings later that they will be gazing up into the skies 
again and comparing them to those once above them 
in Texas. They will forget how keenly they appreciated 
the private's remark about the convicts. If they remem- 
ber, they will wonder. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 
The Border Y. M. C. A. 

In the new Y. M. C. A. building No. 1, used by the 
Seventh and Twelfth New York infantries stationed at 
McAllen, hung a memorandum sheet with the request 
printed at the top that the men kindly indicate by v/riting 
below the subjects in which they were interested and 
every effort would be made to provide speakers on those 
topics. Many of the men had availed themselves of the 
invitation and a closer scrutiny revealed "women," "bil- 
liards," "wine," "tarantula collecting," "mule driving," 
"surf bathing," mingled among the items of weightier 
content. It might indicate to the hasty observer a spirit 
of levity entirely out of keeping with the character of the 
work advanced by the Y. M. C. A., but such is not the 
case. It is but an additional proof that the men regarded 
the institution in the light of something that was distinctly 
"human" and run by men whose viewpoint toward life 
was the same as theirs and who would not throw up their 
hands in holy horror at the first signs that the militiamen 
were not wearing out the knees of their khaki breeches in 
continual prayer. 

"The Y. M. C. A. is the most sensible charitable or 
religious enterprise I've ever run up against," said a for- 
mer footall star of Yale who is now in a troop of Squad- 
ron A. "They don't cast their religion at your head, and 
you can take or leave that part of it, just as you wish." 

158 



Border Y. M. C. A. 159 

I have been at the principal army centers along the 
border. I find that the same feeling exists everywhere, 
and the very fact that ''God's truths" are not crammed 
down the spiritual throats of youthful pagans makes it 
the more difficult to find many who wish to remain in the 
class of unbelievers. It is a work sensibly conceived and 
sensibly carried out. 

Along the Mexican line are thirty-eight of their 
sturdy looking wooden buildings in use by the Y. M. C. A. 
Thirty-seven more are soon to be built. There are 150 
secretaries employed and 104,600 soldiers are served. 
At almost any hour of the day the places may be found 
filled with boys writing home to their families and best 
beloveds. It is here, though the Y. M. C. A. can hardly 
be held responsible, that many of the tales of imaginary 
hardships which the recruits feel it necessary to relate are 
transferred to paper and sent hurrying on their way 
North. 

The buildings are 90 feet long and lighted with 
electricity. Along the sides are writing tables, which are 
the most used articles in the place. The Y. M. C. A. fur- 
nishes all of the paper, and the total on some days is as 
high as 6,000 sheets in a building, although the average 
is about 1,500. What hght there is in the tents of the 
mililiamen is furnished by oil lanterns, and their only 
writing tables are their cots, so it can be seen why this 
feature has proved so popular. 

Occasionally a storm comes along in Texas and 
blows down a large number of the tents, and the men 
have been obhged to look for shelter where they could. 
Many of them have obtained it in the Y. M. C. A. build- 
ings. Twice the one used by the Seventh and Twelfth 



160 Along the Rio Grande 

regiments has been turned into a temporary hospital 
when the tents of the Field Hospital Corps were leveled 
by the wind — once early in August and again on the nine- 
teenth of the same month, when the Field Hospital Corps 
found itself without shelter and when half of the tents in 
other regiments were wrenched from their moorings. 

Books are placed in all of the different branches, 
and it was planned to have about a hundred in each. 
A large part of these come from the Carnegie libraries, 
the rest from private sources. George W. Perkins was 
one of the contributors with a check for ^5,000 and the 
Carnegie Institution sent in an additional ;^65,000. These 
examples have been followed by many, although on not 
so large a scale. The Red Cross sent as their field repre- 
sentative to inquire into conditions on the border Dr. 
E. A. Crockett. It did not take him long to decide upon 
his report. It was brief. "Send all your aid," he wrote, 
"to the Y. M. C. A.," and as a result the Red Cross Asso- 
ciation has been supplying all of the ice which the build- 
ings are able to use — and the item is not a small one. 
Frequent motion picture performances and lectures are 
also held. 

"We don't try to make the fellows feel they are 
black sheep if they fail to avail themselves of the religious 
side of our work," said H. C. Whiteside, one of the secre- 
taries of Building No. 1 at McAllen and a graduate of the 
class of 1910 of Pennsylvania, "but their enthusiasm 
doesn't seem to be dulled on that account. At all of the 
services and lectures the buildings are filled. Frequently 
the army chaplains use the place for their work. 

"We try to have a station for every two or three 
thousand men, but we need additional buildings and thirty- 



Border Y. M. C. A. 161 

four more secretaries. We will need at least $500,000 
to keep up the work if the troops are held much longer 
on the border. So far we have raised $1 50,000 and have 
not been pressed for funds, but the rest must be forthcom- 
ing or it will have to be abandoned." 

In contrast to the sane and normal attitude of the sec- 
retaries in charge and the character of the work itself which 
I have already mentioned, the tone of the publication issued 
by the Y. M. C. A. under the name of Border Work is 
somewhat amusing and reminds one strongly of the experi- 
ences of the professionally reformed at revival meetings. 

Cast your eye over the excerpt which follows. It is 
not hard to picture the writer as he strove for inspira- 
tion with fingers placed tip to tip and his eyes turned 
sanctimoniously toward heaven. It appears under the 
caption of *'A Rare Opportunity for Service." 

"A man came up to the secretary at Camp Cotton, 
El Paso, the other evening when he was the busiest," it 
reads, "and said: '1 must have your help.' His voice 
grew husky and a tear furrowed the dust-begrimed face. 

^'Dropping the work he had in hand, the secretary 
said: 'What may I do for you? ' 

"The soldier showed a sore right hand, which pre- 
vented writing, and after a moment said: 'Just before 
leaving home my Httle girl was taken ill and she didn't 
get any better, but I had to leave the wife and sick girl 
and come on out here. Now I have a telegram saying 
the dear little thing is not expected to live; I must write 
a letter and, yet, because of this hand, I can't. Will you 
do it for me? ' 

"And the secretary, with joy in his heart to be able 
to help, wrote at the soldier's dictation." 



163 Along the Rio Grande 

Then there is another one. It tells, according to 
the headline, "How the Cook Kept Sweet." The cook 
had a hard time. Tarantulas and scorpions had been 
holding dress parade in his close vicinity, some hard- 
hearted person had hung a rattlesnake skin outside of 
his tent. It made him nervous. Added to this it was 
pouring without and the water ''flowed against his al- 
ready wet body." He thought of his task of getting 
breakfast for the boys in the morning and knew that he 
must get some sleep. He decided there were two things 
he could do, dig a trench around his tent and pray. 

"So I got up," the article quotes him as saying, 
"and ditched my pup tent to turn the water off, and then 
I crawled back and put it up to God to give me peace of 
mind and keep me through the night and help me make 
the best of it. And, boys, with that prayer, a peace came 
into my soul and I slept like a babe till daybreak, and 
the boys in my company had their breakfast and had a 
good one." 

It is to be regretted the cook did not try his experi- 
ments separately, instead of bunching his hits. It would 
be well to know definitely the relative eflficiency of the 
invocation and the shovel. 

But the fact still remains that the enterprise is one 
of the most worthy on the border. He who wishes to help 
along a splendid charity is advised in the words of Solo- 
mon to "kick in." It would be difficult to help the army 
in a better way. 



CHAPTER XXV. 
Why the Army's Like a Serpent. 

Napoleon was a great man, yes, a very great man. 
Napoleon spoke many mouthfuls of truths and people 
credit him with many more mouthfuls of fireside sayings 
which he never uttered, but which are just as true. One 
of them was his cryptic (cribbed from a Great philos- 
opher whose name, I think, ends in ''fleas"), remark to 
the effect that an army, like the serpent, travels on its 
belly. 

Of course, the good general had no reference to 
the method of its procedure, but to the fact that the 
stomach (this, I think, is a more refined word for that 
organ) is the all-important thing when any army move- 
ments are to be taken under consideration. He should 
have added that any army's brains exist in its stomach 
and that all its waking, sleeping, working and loafing 
hours are in intimate contact with the same, and he would 
then have been just as right as Sherman when he unfortu- 
nately remarked that war was — well, you know just as 
well as I. 

I've been along a great stretch of border — the border 
can stretch better than anything I know. I've conversed 
with troops from Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachu- 
setts, Rhode Island and Michigan at El Paso, boys from 
Illinois and Wisconsin at San Antonio, a few from New 
Jersey and Montana at Douglas, the very native sons 

163 



16-4 ^^(^>Ks ^^^^ ^^^ Grande - • 

from California, the Idaho and Hartford cavalry troops at 
Nogales, our friends from New Mexico at Columbus and 
a great many others at a great many other places (names 
furnished on request), and I learned that all or any of 
them could conduct an extremely vivid and intelligent 
conversation on the problematical time of their shipment 
home or of the food which is supplied them. 

You have no idea until you have associated with 
the National Guard for some time in what a number of 
different angles food can be approached in a conversa- 
tional way. Food, real or imaginary, seems to possess 
a fascination all its own. In New York a crowd can 
always be gathered by standing in the middle of a street 
and gazing intently up at the top of some tall building. 
On the border it can be accomplished by nonchalantly 
beginning a description of a multiple course dinner witli 
particular emphasis laid upon the fat, opulent appearing 
planked steak with juice oozing from it. 

I was more or less alarmed at first, for I began 
to suspect that the Government was involved in some 
gigantic scheme to starve our boys at the front into a 
comatose state with intent to prevent them from voting 
on election day. 

This thought was first broached to me in El Paso — 
it was the first place at which I had stopped. I heard 
it for the last time at McAllen — it was the last place at 
which I stopped. 

I entered the Palace of Sweets, run by the noble 
Mayor of McAllen. Without mentioning his name, by 
the way, I can safely say that there are persons whom 
the militia stationed at McAllen loved more dearly than 
this worthy person. It was through his efforts that the 



Why the Army's Like a Serpent. 165 

delivery of cream to the First Cavalry and other can- 
teens was stopped; it was through his efforts that the 
larger part of the available cream supply was bought up 
so that the prices for their by-products might be regulated 
as he saw fit. Then, too, said the boys from New York, 
the portions served at his sweet dispensary are more than 
unusually small in ratio to the prices which he affixes 
thereto. In any event, it was due to my search for a 
cigar in his emporium that I had the wicked truth of the 
Government's perfidy unfolded to me. 

An artilleryman, seated with a companion at one 
of the tables, plucked me confidentially by the sleeve. 
He hastily swallowed a spoonful of ice cream which he 
had extracted with great deliberation from the chocolate 
depths of the glass and pointed with the dripping end 
of his soda implement to the red C which a harsh Gov- 
ernment required me to wear, like the scarlet letter, as 
an emblem of my profession as correspondent. 

"What's 'at stand for?" he asked, with the mini- 
mum raising of eyebrows required to denote interroga- 
tion. 

'* 'At means I extract a living from a newspaper," 
1 told him. 

1 knew that I was not yet at liberty to retire, so 
I waited until his spoon returned from another trip mouth- 
ward and was detailed to point out a chair in which I 
might seat myself. 

"Got some good dope for you," he said. "Meet 
my friend." The friend, as nearly as I was able to judge, 
was nameless, but appeared to appreciate the attention 
bestowed upon him, nevertheless. 

"It's this way," the artilleryman began. "The Gov- 



1G6 Along the Rio Grande . 

ernment isn't giving us enough to eat. He emphasized 
his remarks by taking another spoonful. "They get us 
down here so's we can't vote against Wilson when elec- 
tion comes along, and then they starve us." 

His friend nodded vigorously with pleased realization 
of the wisdom and force of the other's remarks. "Yes," 
he said, "they starve us." 

The other continued: "Fellows are getting sick all 
the time because the food is so bum." He waved his 
spoon vigorously. 

"And then when they get sick they ain't treated 
right at the hospital. You go to them with stomach 
trouble" (I had my own private views as to the probable 
reason), "and they give you a pill. You go to them with 
a broken rib and they give you a pill. You go to them 
with anything at all and they'll give you a pill. I guess 
all these boobs know is pills." 

He finished his ice cream, raised his eyes for a brief 
second in thought and decided that he would have another 
one. He included me in the invitation. When none of 
it remained he rose. 

Again he thought, and again the efTort was produc- 
tive of result. 

"Tell you," he said, "you eat with me to-night and 
I'll show you what we get. Government starves us." 

I accepted. Food is scarce in McAllen. The res- 
taurants have reached the heights of their imagination 
when they supply ham and eggs for a meal. I went into 
a place called "Jack's, 2,500 Miles From Sixth Avenue," 
when I arrived. The name is unusually well chosen in 
that their stock in trade gives one the impression of hav- 
ing traveled the entire 2, 5 00 miles by slow freight. It 



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;-- p^/,y the Army's Like a Serpent. 167 

was a little later than the usual meal hour and I found 
the door locked. Being hungry and desperate, I ham- 
mered vigorously. As a great favor I was admitted, 
but only after I had convinced them that my need was 
great. 

"What have you got? ** I asked. 

**Ham and eggs," replied the Mexican who waited 
on me. 

"What else?" I continued, beginning to become 
interested. 

"Ham and eggs," was the stoical reply. "What you 
wish? " 

I thought it over and decided that I would like some 
ham and eggs very much. Perseverance on my part — 
one has to be persevering in McAUen — resulted in adding 
coflfee and sugar to the repast, but was unable to ac- 
complish anything in the line of butter or napkins. My 
artillery friend needed no power of eloquence to induce 
me to accompany him to his camp. 

We jumped into a McAllen "jitney," which charges 
two jitneys for the excursion, and soon found ourselves 
awaiting call to mess. Before it came there was a wild 
scramble for mess kits and from somewhere within the 
depths of a tent my friend dug up one for me, although 
I fear from the heartfelt curses I later heard during the 
meal that they were procured without the owner's knowl- 
edge. 

Large portions of an unidentified soup, consisting 
of peas, carrots, rice and meat, a trifle smaller portions 
of roast beef and sweet potatoes, iced tea and a dessert 
that sometimes goes under the name of "heavenly slush," 



168 Along the Rio Grande. 

which is made up of oranges and bananas sliced together, 
were served to us with the usual quota of flies. These 
latter made necessary "two-handed" eating — one hand 
waves gently back and forth to distress the flies while the 
other conveys food to the mouth. When I finished I 
was reasonably sure I had had a meal — and several 
winged insects. 

My host did it ample justice, but as we cleaned up 
the dishes afterward seemed to be somewhat disap- 
pointed. 

"A httle better than it usually is," he grunted, 
but from other meals which I had had with the troops 
I knew that nowhere were the men in danger of 
starvation. 

Later in the evening we went to the open-air movies. 
1 learned that even when lost in the mysteries of a motion 
picture plot the soldier's mind is still firmly enwrapped in 
food. It is amazing to see, when one's attention is called 
to it, the number of banquet scenes which appear in the 
average photo-play. That evening there were six — each 
one of which caused the men acute mental suffering. 
With the appearance of the waiter at the point where 
the villain had lured the heroine to a restaurant and was 
attempting to ply her with wine, a loud, longing voice 
bellowed an order to the pictured servant. It was a 
simple one, but comprehensive. 

"Waiter," he said, "bring me a blue-point cock- 
tail, canteloupe, two orders of guinea hen and a keg of 
beer." 

Another cried, as one to whom such things were 
a memory of strange luxuries, long since forgotten. 



" ' Why the Army's Like a Serpent. 1BD 

"Look! They've got real tablecloths and butter and 
dishes." 

It neared 9 o'clock, when all enlisted men arc re- 
quired to be in their camps. They began to rise and file 
out. My friend suddenly looked at his watch. 

"Got to go," he said hurriedly. "Goin' to stop 
at the canteen for a bite to eat." 



CHAPTER XXVL 
Little Brown Muchachos. 

"The Mexican race," a Nogales citizen once con- 
fided to me, "would be a fine one if women more tlian 
30 and males past 12 did not form such a large por- 
tion of its population. A senorita atones for a multitude 
of sins on the part of her people, and after knowing their 
boys one wonders how they can grow up into such unde- 
sirable citizens.'* 

Whether or not you are willing to concede their 
failure as adults it is not hard to see a certain amount of 
truth in the remainder of his remarks. 

The beauty of the senorita with more Spanish than 
Indian blood in her veins is too well known to need much 
comment. The Mexican muchacho, however, has re- 
ceived less than is due him. He is the politest person of 
a race universally polite; he is the most friendly and 
guileless person of a race that beneath its politeness is 
suspicious and treacherous. It may be they are a proof 
of the possibilities of the Mexican race if it received 
treatment which did not tend to bring out its worst qual- 
ities. They are the happiest things in the world with 
the least to make them joyous, it is a happiness of the 
contagious variety. They have such an utmost con- 
fidence in every one that it's hard to explain how such 
trust can vanish with manhood. 

One of the most alluring outdoor sports in McAUen 
170 



Little Brown Muchachos. 171 

is shoeshfning, both for the shiner and the shinee. All 
day long barefooted boys with high piping voices travel 
the street crying "Shine, senor." It is the one thing 
upon which the McAllen price has not soared — it remains 
at five cents — cinco centavos, somewhat surprising in 
view of the fact that for each shine it requires the services 
of not one young man, but six or more. 

The muchacho possesses a sixth sense, of this I am 
certain. As an experiment I have waited to engage the 
services of a future revolutionist when none of his kind 
were in sight. In less than a minute there were seven 
added starters seated in front of me on their upturned 
boxes giving expert advice, the result of weeks of experi- 
ence, upon the art of polishing. They watched the pro- 
ceedings with eyes of awe and wonder — for a shoe shine 
in McAllen is a thing of mystery — one not to be taken 
lightly. 

The small, round felt hat which they wear is not 
the least part of their attire. More than ever it gives 
them the appearance of little foreign brownies. Their 
shirts, with the collars turned in and the sleeves rolled 
up, were once the property of some older brother. How 
the first born came by his I am unable to say, but I am 
convinced there must be factories for the express purpose 
of turning out second hand shirts for diminutive border 
boys. They are never new. 

Shoeshining is not a business, as one might think, 
but a relaxation for the muchachos. Otherwise they 
would not be so prodigal with the amount of polish which 
they use, nor with the length of time which they expend 
on each shoe. At the completion of their job red paste 
is everywhere — on their hands, their shirts and the en- 



172 Along the Rio Grande 

thusiastically smiling faces turned up to tell you they 
are finished. A tip sends them into a dehrium of joy, 
although the chief pleasure they receive from their opera- 
tions is an artistic rather than a pecuniary one. 

Most of them speak little English, but instead con- 
verse glibly in Spanish with their gallery. When one 
enjoys the services of a linguist, however, the fact does 
not long remain a secret, for pride in his mastery of the 
gringo language is such that he insists on telling his em- 
ployer all of his brief past life and his soaring ambitions 
for the future. In their roseate insight into the land of 
manana, the fearless toreador takes the place of the 
circus clown of the American youth, and the noble art 
of warfare contains for them infinite more allurement 
than the bluecoated life of a policeman. 

Dan, from whom 1 obtained the greatest part of 
my information, told me he was attaining a great pro- 
ficiency through faithful practice on the family goat. 
He had trained the creature to charge in a most satisfying 
manner and needed no rag of red to stimulate his desire 
for an unhampered life. If he could sidestep a goat with 
such agility and accuracy, he asked with an unexplained 
faith in my judgment of a born bull-fighter, why wouldn't 
he be just as successful with bulls, and didn't I think he 
would win much fame as a toreador? I certainly did, 
and I made him promise to let me know in suflicient time 
that I might be present at his first public appearance. 
He left me, so enwrapped in the allurement of his 
dreams, that for once he was unconscious of the admiring 
group of seven who followed him up the street. 

Their courtesy is unfailing. It seems to be sincere, 
probably because, in contrast to their parents, they are 



s ? 



/.^i,' - k^-^'" 







,^ih 




Little Brown Muchachos. 173 

as vet ij2:norant of the hardness of the world about them. 
Unlike most chiMren, they follow the mandates of Dolite- 
ness even where it involves physical or mental discom- 
fort on their part. 

As I neared a wooden shed in McAllen containing 
shower baths — for in that part of Texas bathing is a 
distinct institution, entirely separate from one's lod5:ing, 
and if one would bathe he pays for it — I noticed be- 
neath a swarm of flies a tiny youth carrying: a lar^e basket 
of cakes. Attracted, like the flies, bv the burden of the 
delicacies supported by the youthful salesman, were a 
group of children. A sp?^sm of generosity shook my 
bosom I heM forth ten cents. 

"Here," I said, as the eves of his followers nearly 
popped out of their brown heads in eae"er anticipation. 
"Take all the doughnuts that buys and divide them up 
among yourselves." 

Forth from the basket his small hand took ten crul- 
lers. Including himself, there were eleven boys in the 
party. I awaited developments. Each in turn greedily 
received his piece until all but the vendor had one. 

"Aren't you going to get any? " I asked. 

"There are but ten cakes and eleven of us, senor," 
he replied, somewhat embarrassed. "I will go without.'* 
He would gladly have done so, too, for politeness de- 
manded it, but I produced another centavo from the re- 
cesses of my pocket and enabled him to participate in 
the fiesta with the others. He ate it with a haste that 
convinced me his generosity had not been the product of 
a lack of appetite. 

Perhaps you are skeptical of the kindness of a char- 
ity furnishing doughnuts to 5 -year-olds, but it is because 



174 Along the Rio Grande 

you are unaware of how digestible they are compared to 
the usual diet. From their earliest months they are fed 
on tortillas covered with chili sauce, frijoles and other 
articles of food so highly spiced one wonders if originally 
the Mexicans were not related in some way to the goats 
seen so frequently about their places. 

The unsuspecting faith in human nature which is 
the happy possession of the Mexican nino is due to the 
kindness and love he receives in his family and the genial 
tolerance which he enjoys from the rest of the world. 
The youngsters amuse the militiaman along the border. 
He feels none of the antipathy for them which he ex- 
tends to the men of the race. The children sense this, 
and their attitude toward the strange soldiers who have 
invaded the border is one of intense curiosity combined 
with a large amount of liking. 

They are too young yet to know how their parents 
hate the gringoes, or why. They only know them now 
as men who laugh good naturedly and give them money, 
real money, for services rendered. 

Strangest of all their characteristics and the hardest 
to understand, is the perpetual sunlight in their hearts, 
which seems not to become less bright even when they 
reach maturity. Among the lower classes life is little 
else than existence. When they are still almost only in- 
fants their parents are forced, unwillingly, to put them 
to work, for in spite of love empty stomachs must be fed. 

Even before their years permit of work their imag- 
inations are not sufficiently well developed to supply them 
with much amusement. Their games are few and their 
sports seem to consist chiefly of swimming like muskrats 
in irrigation canals, rolling iron hoops along a dusty road 



■ Little Brown Muchachos. 175 

or walking busily along the same dusty roads to no place 
in particular. But wherever they wander or whatever 
they are doing one does not have to wait long before 
hearing them burst forth in song. It's a song of to-mor- 
row and happiness. Whether or not that particular ''to- 
morrow" finds them altered to irresponsible, suspicious, 
thieving and treacherous men there is one characteristic 
in which there will be no change. They will still be 
singing happily of manana. It will be another to-mor- 
row, to be sure, but one in which their faith has not been 
lessened by the disappointments they have suffered in 
the past 



CHAPTER XXVIL 

Getting the Range of the Texas Ranger. 

Have you ever seen a bunch of chickens scatter 
when a belHgerent rooster stalks into their midst? You 
know then the appearance of a group of Mexicans in any 
of the border towns when a Texas ranger looms above 
the horizon. Mexicans are an emotional people, but 
there is no emotion quite so strongly implanted within 
their cofifee-colored bosoms as the fear of the men whom 
the Texans have chosen to uphold law and order. The 
average Mexican will believe anything told to him. 

At Columbus, N. M., some oil cars were drawn up 
on the track to be used for the transportation of water. 
The Mexicans were informed the cars were to be filled 
with American soldiers and sent across the line in order 
that Mexicans might be massacred. Why they figured 
that American troops, if they wished to go across the line, 
wouldn't do so in the usual manner I am unable to say, 
other than that, with them, hearsay is fact. Their leaders 
have likewise imparted to them that if the State of Texas, 
with its fearsome rangers, were removed they would be 
able to whip the United States, so they have adhered 
religiously to this belief also. But their respect for these 
gentlemen is better founded than their other convictions. 

The story related of the report made by two rangers 
to their captain gives an idea of the manner in which 
they handle these people. "We met two Mexicans on 
the road," it read, "but did not have time to bury them." 

176 




Looming above the horizon. 



Getting the Range. 177 

"They are the most cold-blooded bunch of persons 
in the world," said an El Pasoan in speaking to me of the 
rangers. 'They have no regard for human life what- 
ever, and it's because of this that Mexicans are in such 
deadly fear of them. Whenever they arrest one of the 
greasers they rarely disarm him, and allow him every 
opportunity to get away. I asked one the reason for 
this once and he replied, They might try to start some- 
thing if we leave their arms on them, and a dead Mexican 
is always a lot less trouble than a live one. We would 
have to kill 'em in self-defense.' " 

I heard other tales of their cruelty. A young Mexi- 
can in Shafter was shot and badly wounded. The only 
person present with him at the time and who knew any- 
thing about it was his father. The rangers wished to find 
out who was responsible. The father refused to tell. 
Mexicans resemble Indians greatly in that they prefer to 
right their own wrongs rather than resort to legal pro- 
cedure. 

"I'll find out whether you'll tell or not," the ranger 
is reported to have said, and raised up on his toes in order 
to get more force into the blow. He brought down the 
butt of his revolver on the unfortunate man's head. The 
silent parent was nearly killed, but this was the only por- 
tion of the desired result obtained. He remained as clam- 
like as ever and was thrown into jail in order that he 
might ponder over the request which had been made of 
him. Later, through the influence of a doctor who upon 
dressing his wounds, ascertained that he was imprisoned, 
not because he had committed any crime but for being 
ignorant concerning one which had been committed, he 
was released. 



'l'J'8 "Along the Rio Grande 

"Shortly after that," continued my source of in- 
formation, "we requested all Texas rangers to leave Shaf- 
fer. We consider the greasers good citizens and efficient 
workers there and we didn't care to have them contin- 
ually shot up for the amusement of these ranger fellows. 
Shafter is sixty miles from the nearest railroad station, 
Marfa, and it is too difficult to replace labor of their qual- 
ity for us not to exercise some concern about the manner 
in which they are treated." 

"One of the principal reasons for our continual 
trouble with Mexico," I heard another person say, "is 
because of the brutality they endure at the hands of 
the rangers and persons who have adopted ranger meth- 
ods. A ranger can shoot a poor peon with im- 
punity, and he is scarcely asked even to put in the usual 
plea of self-defense, which is as a general rule an untrue 
one anyway. No race, however ignorant or down-trod- 
den, is going to submit to this for long without feeling 
an overwhelming sentiment, not only against the rangers 
themselves, but against the race from which they come. 
They're human, just like anybody else, and even though 
their lives aren't the most pleasant possible, they prefer 
to have them ended in the natural way." 

One will find just as many persons, however, who 
have only the highest praise for the rangers and the 
work they do, and I am inclined to number myself among 
them. Rangers are only cold-blooded, they maintain, 
where Mexicans are concerned, and this solely because 
they have learned it is the one manner In which they 
can be properly handled. In all the border towns one 
finds the percentage of Mexicans far greater than that of 
Americans. In Texas there are 234,000 Mexicans, in 



Getting the Range. 179 

New Mexico 22,000 and 52,000 in Arizona. The only 
thing that Mexicans appreciate is force and unless they 
were kept by the rangers in this constant state of fear 
it would be impossible to handle them, as throughout 
the State of Texas there are only seventy-five of these 
police, four companies in all. 

There is just as much romance and mystery con- 
nected with their lives as there is with those of the 
Northwest Mounted Police, and for this reason it has 
always somewhat surprised me that no one has seen in 
them the possibilities for motion picture productions. 
Their pay is small, $40 a month being their recompense, 
and their hours of duty are not hampered by complica- 
tions — they work twenty-four out of twenty-four. It 
can be seen from this that the majority of those in the 
ranks are not there because they have deemed it an 
easy method of earning one's living. It is the spirit of 
adventure and the desire for excitement that in the main 
is the moving impulse. Some have incomes of their own 
to render them independent of the pay allowed them by 
the State. It would be a simple matter for Texas to 
enlarge the body if it wished. There are many who would 
like to join, but are refused because no more are desired. 
It is not hard to distinguish them, whether one happens to 
have been favored with an introduction or not. One 
glance at their sombrero hat and their Colt's .45 slung 
from a cartridge belt filled with their chief arguments is 
enough. 

They seem to be possessed of a rare faculty of being 
on h nd wherever trouble arises. Part of this is largely 
due no doubt to luck, but more, I think, to the fact that 
rangers, even while indulging in an apparently idle con- 



180 Along the Rio Grande 

versation, are not allowing moss to grow on their brains. 
They lose little time in making for that part of the coun- 
try where chance clues have told them something is 
"liable to be pulled oflf." 

There are no better trail finders nor handier men 
with their guns in the South. At a hundred yards or 
more a man is invariably dead if a ranger judges his life 
a burden on the community. Outside of the realms of 
fiction there are few men able with a revolver to hit a 
quarter thrown up in the air, but there are more capable 
of punishing Uncle Sam's currency in this fashion among 
the rangers than in the entire remainder of the Texas 
population. As a rule they are natural detectives. Very 
small clues indeed frequently result in their solving the 
cases upon which they are working. An instance of this 
was told me by John Kelly in Douglas, Ariz. 

Kelly was a ranger, and although he no longer holds 
his commission as such, his thoughts still live in the days 
when he was employed by the State. 

"I used to be stationed at Ysleta years ago," he said, 
biting off a chew of plug cut, "when there wasn't any 
railroads comin' into El Paso, and when all freight had 
to be hauled in 'Chihuahua trains,' which is the same as 
prairie schooners, all the way from San Antonio. Th'ere 
used to be a lot of smugglin' goin' on along the Rio 
Grande, and it was up to us to keep the greasers and 
outlaws from doin' it. One time we caught a gang with 
$500 worth of stuff." He spit contemplatively and 
looked at me reflectively to see whether I was impressed 
with the size of the amount. 

"One time a fellow named Jem Lafferty killed the 
marshal at Ysleta. He shot him through the neck. We 




It is not difficult to distinguish a Ranger. 



" ■ " Getting the Range 181 

found the marshal's body lying on the ground and near 
it was a little piece of a bandana, clipped off by a bullet. 
We saved it and hunted for Jem. It took us some time, 
but we got him. He was still a-wearin' of the handker- 
chief around his neck. The bit we had fitted into the 
part lost out of his. He was convicted and sentenced to 
nine years in the pen. Later he killed another guy and 
got seventy-five years. He was about 50 then and never 
lived his sentence out." 

The rangers have some sort of signal unknown to 
any but the elect. "There was a dance being held in 
the hall at Ysleta," one of the inhabitants of this town 
informed me, "and several of the rangers were there. 
They usually turn up at such functions, for their reputa- 
tion for bravery and their invariable good looks make 
them extremely popular with the fair sex. Suddenly 
they all stopped and made a dive for their guns, which 
they had checked at the door. None of the rest of us 
had heard a thing, but in a minute they had disappeared 
and were off for the river. They returned after a while 
and we asked what had happened, but, as always, they 
refused to say anything concerning their work. Some 
one told me later that they had shot some Mexicans 
trying to rustle cattle and buried them where they fell, 
but the only thing on which they based their story was 
three newly-dug graves." 

Although they are good natured and forbearing, as 
a rule, where white people are concerned, it is unwise 
for a person to rely too much on this characteristic. It 
is a point of honor with them to get any one who has 
ever killed a ranger. The person sought would save him- 
self a great deal of mental strain by choosing the "Dutch 



182 Along th£ Rio Grande 

method" out — that of suicide when such is the case — 
for his destination is invariably the same. Small matters 
like extradition papers bother them not in the least, for 
if they desire a person they will arrest — or shoot — him 
whether he is in Texas, Wyoming, Mexico or way sta- 
tions. 

He is a person one does not associate with trifling, 
but if trifling is essential to your happiness — let the 
ranger do it. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 
The Lady of the Army. 

Sh! Ever since the New York troops went into 
their encampments at Pharr, McAllen and Mission there 
had been a lady present in their midst. No attempt was 
made to conceal her existence, and whenever any men- 
tion was made of her any of the enlisted men would 
frankly admit a warm acquaintance. The suspense was 
getting awful — her name is Dame Rumor. I found no 
place in my travels along the border where she seemed 
to be quite so popular as in the ranks of the Seventh 
Regiment, for the young gentlemen of that organization 
were perhaps a little keener to return to their professions 
than the others, and there was constantly some new 
rumor being circulated around the camp as to when they 
would be ordered back. 

The enlisted man was supposed to know little about 
the doings and plans of the army other than what he 
was told, and to their regret almost nothing at all was told 
them. As a result millions of unofficial rumors were flying 
from one tent to another, having their birth in many and 
varied ways. 

'There are not as many rumors now as there were 
the first few days we were down here," one of the pri- 
vates told me when I commented on it. "There was a 
new one every five minutes then." I had not been there 
for a very long time then, but my short observation had 

183 



184 Along the Rio Grande 

not led me to think the average had greatly been dimin- 
ished in the interim. 

It was not so long before that the word was being 
passed from one company street to the other for the 
cook details to "go and get your meat." By the time 
the order reached Company K, a few hundred yards 
farther along, a wild cheering broke out. The order 
had been twisted into "We're going home next week." 
There hadn't been such excitement in the regiment during 
all the long, weary hours they had been down there. It 
was not hard to see from this how, as a general rule, much 
of the news that was breezed about camp in this manner 
possessed almost any virtue except accuracy; but its lack 
of this necessary quality didn't seem to interfere in any 
way with the speed with v/hich it traveled nor in the im- 
plicit and childlike faith placed in it. Their very confi- 
dence in what they had heard caused the correspondents 
in this town many weary chases in an attempt to verify 
some startling information. 

In Company K, which was fairly near the center of 
the regimental encampments, and hence was favorably 
located for the circulation of gossip, resided a cook pos- 
sessed of a cunning deep and low. His name was Carroll 
Winchester. A stranger could quite easily identify him by 
his handsome black mustache and the fact that his sole 
articles of attire were a pair of overalls, socks and shoes, 
which left ample space for the tanning influence of the 
sun. Winchester a few weeks before started what he 
called a rumor factory. As he mused over the onions or 
potatoes he would invent some story and start it on its way 
with the assistance of the slavish cook detail which hap- 
pened to be assigned to help him on the day. Then he 



The Lady of the Army 185 

waited to see how great an interval would be required for 
the rumor to return again to its maker. It never took 
long for it to pass completely through the regiment sev- 
eral times. Like a good little rumor, it always came home 
before evening. Once within half an hour after he had 
originated a piece of scandal Winchester had it poured 
forth into his ear with bated breath by a man from an- 
other regiment. 

"Yes," said Winchester when his informant had fin- 
ished, "I have heard that before." 

In this same company for which Winchester pre- 
pared the meals a rumor book was kept for some time, 
until it became a hopeless task to make any attempt to 
write down in it a portion of all that was heard. A glance 
over it would show that, v/hile most of the entries con- 
cern the date of the return home, by no means all of them 
are of that nature: 

"It is rumored that Private Swain is using tent No. 
11 as a private office and needs a secretary to care for 
his mails," says the first item in the record. Reference 
was made, it might be explained, to the great number of 
missives received by Mr. Swain in feminine handwriting. 
From day to day appeared others, most of them as 
usual incorrect, such as "it is rumored that the Squadron 
A refused to take the oath"; "that a captain of the 
Seventy-first and a mule of the same were shot by a sen- 
tinel on post for refusal to halt when challenged"; "that 
we will be in New York by August 10, 1916"; "that we 
are to have cots and floors in the tents some time" (the 
cots finally arrived) ; "that the rookies are going to give us 
proper refreshments with the entertainments which they 
are to provide"; "that all married men are to go home on 



186 Along the Rio Grande 

furlough"; "that we are to leave the border at 4 A. M., 
July 12"; "that it rained about 2 this morning" (this 
was slightly sarcastic, as that day the only comfortable 
method of progression about camp was in a boat) ; "posi- 
tively heard (on July 12) by wireless operator of the 
Signal Corps that the Seventh Regiment will start Sat- 
urday to escort General Pershing to the border"; "that 
we will spend one week on the border in pup tents, return 
to camp in McAllen until August 25, then go 100 miles 
east of El Paso until October 1, and then back to New 
York"; "it is rumored that the Squadron A men will 
shortly be disbanded to receive commissions"; "that our 
camp is to be turned at some future date into an army 
post for the regulars"; "that the Second Artillery band 
wishes to be transferred to the Seventh" (this rumor did 
not originate with the artillery) ; "that the chaplain's 
laundry was delayed about three weeks and when it finally 
did return it contained woman's clothing." And then 
appeared the concluding item, after which the rumor book 
was given up as a hopeless proposition, "It is rumored 
that we go home this week." 

When other regiments went out on hikes from Mc- 
Allen to other points rumors would soon be floating 
around the Seventh Regiment camp of startHng cas- 
ualities. 

"Men are dropping out like flies," I was told of the 
Seventy-first, which was on its weary way to Mission 
and all points west. "There have been several deaths 
in the Third," another informed me a short while after 
the latter had arrived in McAllen. Lurid details were 
furnished in each instance and the impression was vig- 
orously conveyed to me that the extermination of both 



The Lady of the Army 187 

these noble bodies of men was but a matter of a few 
days if their terrible march continued. I hurried to the 
Third headquarters, about half a mile from the Seventh. 
I found more than 500 "dog tents'* pitched out in a field 
which had been prepared for the purpose. Men were 
proceeding in the usual manner, as if nothing out of the 
ordinary had happened, and I even failed to observe on 
the faces of the men who passed the signs of fatigue 
which I expected might be there after their march. 

"Where are the dead men? " I asked at headquarters, 
which consisted of a tent larger than the others. 

'There aren't any," was the response. "One man 
who was taken sick before we started came in the ambu- 
lance, but it will be a long time before he dies." I pro- 
ceeded to the ambulances. No corpses were to be hidden 
from me; I was determined. 

"How many passed out on the march?" I queried 
the driver. 

"None," he said, and told me of the man of whom 
I had already heard. After this I phoned to Mission and 
found that but a few of the Seventy-first had been un- 
able to continue, and most of them were bothered only 
with foot trouble. The other rumors which reached my 
ears had much in common with these, but they all had 
one merit — they furnished the militiamen with enter- 
tainment and interest. 

The most convincing of recent rumors was on Au- 
gust 30. Three regiments of New York troops were to 
be ordered home. It was not long before some one was 
discovered with information from a confidential but au- 
thoritative source that the Seventh was to be one of 
the chosen three. The logic was indisputable — so was 



188 Along the Rio Grande 

the excitement. The Seventh had been the first of the 
New York contingent to reach the region misnamed 
''God's Country." More of their number had pressing 
business at home suffering more each day by their con- 
tinued absence. Yes, there could be no doubt that they 
were to go home. When word came from General Fun- 
ston that the Seventy-first, Third and Fourteenth were 
the ones elected the gloom could have been cut with a 
knife. 

"Rumors," I heard one man say in a depressed 
voice, "are no good unless they are bad, and then they're 
no good. If they are good they're usually untrue, and 
then you feel worse after you find out what's really so 
than you did at first. If they're bad they make you ill 
anyway. From now on I'm going to be on the rumor 
wagon, and if any one tries to tell me one I'll shoot him 
on sight." 

But on the morrow he would have a new morsel to 
circulate, one that was authoritative and from a confi- 
dential source. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 
The Songs of the Seventh. 

Upon the average human a shower bath has the 
same effect as the sound of running water upon a canary 
— it makes him sing. The Seventh possesses no shower 
baths nor yet is it canarylike, able to Hsten to the sound 
of running water. But life upon the border seemed to have 
produced the same result — a deal of carolling. If mo- 
bilization succeeded in doing nothing else for our men it 
at least supplied them with a good coat of tan and de- 
veloped their lung power to a remarkable extent. At 
almost any time during the sweltering day or the balmy 
evenings their voices could be heard uplifted in song. 

Like the cowboy, the militiamen sung ballads 
that told of their griefs as well as their joys — although 
the latter were chiefly conspicuous by their infrequency; 
of their hardships and of their desire to return once more 
to their homes. Most of those for which youthful poets 
in the Seventh are responsible were not composed to win 
smiles of approval from their officers. Song is a form 
of outlet for repressed feelings, and the men of the Sev- 
enth felt the strongest on the subject of their detention 
on the border. In addition to that, there is always enou^ih 
of the child remaining even in men approaching ihc 
thirties to revel in ''going out behind the barn to smoke." 
Doggerel voicing rebellion against the discipline and hard- 

189 



190 Along the Rio Grande 

ships to which they were subject is the result. I doubt 
if they felt as deeply as the verses would lead one to 
suspect, but in any event the muse became a safety 
valve to their emotions. Following is the first which I 
heard at McAllen: 

When we get back from Mexico, 

When we get back from war; 
The National Guard can go to hell? 

We won't enlist no more. 
We'll take a bath and change our clothes, 

And swear before the Lord, 
To emigrate to Michigan 

And vote for Henry Ford. 

When they started out for the land of cactus they 
were a trifle more enthusiastic. There issued forth from 
the trains filled with the men of the Seventh the well 
used tune of 'Tipperary," with words somewhat altered. 
If you were within a radius of four miles of the cars you 
could hear: 

It's a long, long way to capture Villa; 

It's a long way to go; 
It's a long way across the border 

Where the dirty greasers grow; 
So it's good-by to dear old Broadway, 

Hello, Mexico; 
It's a long, long way to capture Villa, 

But that's where we'll go. 

But after they had dug a few ditches, broken in 
unruly mules and tried their hand at guard duty for 
several nights their patriotism began to wane. The edge 
of their keen desire to capture the flighty bandit became 



Songs of the Seventh 191 

somewhat blunted. This is how the life impressed a 
soldierly poet of Company K: 

We've been upon the border for a couple of months or so; 
We're getting mighty tired, and we think it's time to go; 
We've dug in the mud and laid the roads, and now we'd like to know 
When we'll go marching home. 

To hell, to hell with dear old Texas, 
To hell, to hell with all the cactus. 
To hell, to hell with all the "Mexs". 
Three cheers for New York townl 

Our home is Camp McAllen, and we're very happy here; 
But we haven't any sweethearts, and we haven't any beer; 
We haven't any money, and we'd really like to hear 
When we go marching home. 

(Chorus, Please.) 

The wop who laid the pavement, the mick who builds the pike, 
Both get their union wages — if they don't they call a strike; 
Half a dollar to the soldiers, and no matter what they like, 
They still go marching on. 

(Chorus.) 

We signed enlistment papers and they told us with a smile, 
"You may go down to Mexico, but only for a while"; 
They promised us all luxuries and said we'd live in style 
Just the way we do at home. 

(Chorus Once Again.) 

We found the thorny cactus, the scorpion and the toads, 
Tarantulas and centipedes and rattlesnakes in loads; 
The flies and ants and other bugs infested our abodes. 
Good Lord, let us go home. 

(Repeat on the Chorus.) 
Walking by Company K street one day I glanced up 



192 Along the Rio Grande 

it to see a private seated in the greatest luxury in one 
of those reclining canvas chairs of which nearly every 
tent possesses one. His nose v/as slightly tilted toward 
the heavens and from his throat issued a song which had 
attained more or less popularity with the Seventh and 
other infantry regiments. 

The infantry, the infantry, 

With the dirt behind their ears; 
The infantry, the infantry, 

Who lap up all the beers. 
The cavalry, artillery 

And the blooming engineers, 
Couldn't make the infantry 

In a hundred thousand years. 

Of course, it is quite possible that the information 
conveyed in this poem is not strictly fact, but, as Matthew 
Prior tells us, "Odds life! Must one swear to the truth 
of a song? " 

Naturally the Seventh exerted its energies on songs 
other than the ones v/hich have originated in their midst. 
Those old-time favorites, such as "Sweet Adeline," with 
a human bullfrog repeating ever and anon with deep 
sympathy the last few words, "On the Road to Manda- 
lay." "Some folks (apparently possessed of exceedingly 
bad judgment) say that a nigger won't steal," and 
many more that helped to brighten their college 
years and bring sighs to fair listening maidens, floated 
often on the Texas breeze in strong competition with 
burros whose lungs seemed to be in constant need of 
oihng. 

After noticing the frequency with which their efforts 
were directed toward vocal work I stopped a couple of 



Songs of Ihe Seventh 193 

militiamen. "You can't be having such a bad time down 
here, as a lot of you try to tell me," I said, "or you 
wouldn't be singing so much." The shorter one turned 
to me with gloom-filled eyes, and I knew that what he 
said came from the heart. 

"We are saddest," he murmured, "when we sing." 



CHAPTER XXX. 
Both Sides of the Army Pill. t 

Truly the imagination of the militia man is a won- 
drous thing. I once knew an elderly gentleman who had 
such a one. He was a Civil War veteran, and during 
some period in his life he had obtained a copy of the 
memoirs of another old warrior. Not long afterward the 
experiences became his. He recounted them so many 
times that he really believed he had undergone the ad- 
ventures himself. One day a friend of his with an exact 
turn of mind and a long memory proved that the story 
he had just related was impossible, for he would have 
had to be present in two places at the same time. I have 
seldom seen such amazement as that registered on his 
face. So convinced had he become of the authenticity 
of his oft-repeated tales that I doubt whether even now 
he is able to account for the paradox which was pointed 
out to him. 

The National Guard on the border was afflicted 
with much the same disease, particularly where stories 
of the hospital were concerned. They had told certain 
tales of its horrors so long that they were doubtless in 
time certain they were true. Many of them, heard from 
some other person, they believed to be events in their 
own hectic careers. It wasn't due to a desire wilfully to 
misinform any one — it was just an affliction of too much 
imagination, like my friend, the veteran. 

Upon my arrival among the New York troops my 

1©4 



Both Sides of the Army Pill 196 

cars were filled with the gruesome details of the inade- 
quacy of the military hospitals. I was led to believe that 
they had been devised for no other purpose than to heap 
additional torture upon men whom the Government had 
brought South solely for an orgy of pain. 

A red-headed fighter, whom I found in one of the 
infantry tents changing his clothes preparatory to ap- 
pearing at "retreat," which is held every day at 5.30, 
regardless of how the soldiers feel about it, expressed 
himself in vehement language to me. 

"No matter what's the matter with you," he said, 
"they hand you out pills for stomach trouble. If you 
break your back they give you one pill every hour; 
if you've got appendicitis, it's more pills; pills 
again for typhoid and pills if you get cactus in your feet. 
The whole medical department is a bunch of pills. A 
fellow from Squadron A in the cavalry broke his nose. 
The hospital didn't have any nose splints. He had to 
have it broken over again three times afterward to get 
it fixed right. A man from the Seventh complained of 
having stomach trouble. He went to the doctor. The 
orderly handed him out some Allen's Foot Ease and told 
him to take it. It was the one thing they had besides 
the pills, I guess, and they wanted to see how it would 
work. It didn't kill him, so they haven't tried it again. 
They haven't got any surgical instruments up there. All 
of the officers' tents have board floors," he added, with 
increasing bitterness, "but they haven't had time to put 
them down in the hospital tents yet. 

"This isn't enough, so once they get you in they 
starve you to death. And now," he said, giving his 
cartridge belt a last savage yank and picking up his car- 



196' Along the Rio Grande 

bine from the rack, "Vm going out to have the captain 
ask me why my shoes aren't shined." 

"Wait just a minute before you go. Have you ever 
been confined to the hospital? " I asked. 

*'No," he replied. "I'm unprejudiced." He hur- 
ried off. 

The next day I went to the hospital myself, not as 
a patient, but as an investigator of crime. 

At 6.5 A. M. sick call is sounded. An acquaintance 
told me the reason for having it after breakfast in this 
fashion is because the "food handed out in the morning 
is enough to make any one ill, and they wish a few 
patients to practice on." At this hour any one disabled 
reports to his captain and he is sent to the regimental hos- 
pital for examination. It is the purpose here not to keep 
men whose condition indicates they will be confined for 
more than forty-eight hours. Cases requiring several 
days are assigned to the field hospital. Those more seri- 
ous, requiring attention for ten days or more, are taken 
to the base hospital at San Antonio. 

The regimental hospital of the Seventh, which was 
typical, was in charge of a major, three captains, a heu- 
tenanc, and had twenty-four orderlies. It consisted of only 
two tents, one of which was used as the office and to 
store all medical supplies, and the other for the patients. 
Those who had reported were examined and the diagnosis 
delivered to the captain, together v/ith data concerning 
the disposition to be made of them. There are three 
forms of this disposition — "light duty," "sick in quarters" 
and "sick in hospital." In the first instance they are 
relieved from all heavy work and in the others they are 
freed entirely of the army routine. If the case is one 




The cvhole medical department is a bunch of pills." 



Both Sides of the Army PHI 19f 

for the field hospital he is brought there with the report 
of the regimental medical department. They, in turn, 
decide whether or not he is to be transferred to San 
Antonio. 

"Within twenty-four hours a man taken sick can be 
examined and turned over to the base hospital at San 
Antonio," an oflficer of the First Field Hospital told me. 
''Wherever possible, cases requiring operation are trans- 
ported there, but when immediate attention is required 
we have an operating table and can handle it. Just a 
short time ago we performed a successful operation on 
a patient suflfering from acute appendicitis and another 
was a herniotomy. 

"The First Field Hospital Corps," he continued, 
"consists of three wards, each of which has four units, 
or tents, containing four cots apiece. This gives us a 
capacity of forty-eight. We have six officers, including 
a major, two captains, three lieutenants and sixty-four 
orderlies. All of the officers are New York specialists, 
and as they rise in rank are required to pass a severe 
medical examination. You can see there is very little 
opportunity for the inefficiency sometimes complained of 
by the army." 

He took me through the three rows of tents and 
showed me the operating tent, those containing the sick 
and the kitchen and mess tents. All were scrupulously 
clean and possessed board floors and wire screenings. 

"Those who criticize this department," he said, as 
we went through, "overlook the fact that the whole idea 
in back of the regimental and field hospitals is that we are 
mobile units and must travel with the army. We do not 
pretend to take care of serious cases — San Antonio does 



19^ Alonx the Rio Grande 

that. The regimental medical department must be ready 
to move at an instant's notice, while we must never be 
more than twenty-four hours behind the troops. One 
thing that renders our work difficult is that many men 
'fake' illness in order to escape work. A record is kept 
of every patient, however, and if he comes too often 
to the well without cause he is extremely apt to suffer 
the fate of +he proverbial pitcher. 

*The men have nothing to complain of in their 
treatment here. The food furnished them is light, but 
purposely so, for a sick man should not receive as much 
to eat as one who is doing heavy work. Some of them 
prefer to gorge, and when they are not allowed to do so 
believe they are being starved." 

He waved his hands toward the cots containing 
invalids, pale looking in spite of their tanned faces, and 
said: "Ask any of them. They will tell you whether 
what I am saying is true or not." He saved me the trouble 
of deciding whether or not it would be making the men 
feel as if they were freaks on exhibition. 

"How are you getting along?" he asked a young 
fellow, who, I found out later, was the herniotomy in- 
dividual. The boy had been taking a rather hollow-eyed 
interest in the conversation. He brightened up consid- 
erably when addressed and expatiated at great 
length upon the treatment par-excellence which he had 
been receiving. Others responded in similar vein. As 
evidence I did not attach a superlative amount of im- 
portance to what they said, since 1 doubted whether they 
would indulge in criticism too freely in the presence of 
an officer, but a careful examination of the place, both 
then and later, convinced me what I had been told was 



Both Sides of the Army Pill 199 

authentic. I talked with them later alone, and they re- 
peated to me practically the same things. The only 
evidence in support of what had been breathed in my 
ear by my red-headed friend was that in the regimental 
hospital tent there was no flooring, although this was not 
the case in the field. 

However, before I left I turned to my guide. "Do 
you carry anything besides pills and Allen's Foot Ease 
in stock? " I asked. He pointed to a row of bottles with 
formidable Latin names on their exteriors. 

"We're allowed twenty different drugs," he said, 
"and whenever the supply in any one begins to run low 
we put in a requisition for more. It can be obtained 
within a day. There is no reason at all why we should 
ever be found without any one of them." 

I thanked him and left. I hurried to my friend 
of the brilliant locks. 1 told him of the herniotomy vic- 
tim's testimony. 

"Humph!" he retorted, "he was probably afraid if 
he said anything else they would poison him." 



CHAPTER XXXI. 
Baking on the Border. 

Since visiting the diflferent military groups along the 
border my respect for that household necessity, the Staff 
of Life, has risen tremendously. A lover of statistics, 
seeing the army bakeries, would have a perfect orgy. It 
would not make much difference whether he went to 
merely the one at Nogales, Ariz., managed by Lieutenant 
Francis W. Pinches of the First Connecticut Infantry, 
which worked away for the benefit of 1 1,000 stomachs in 
the Nogales District, or that in charge of Captain C. A. 
Bach, at El Paso, Texas, which didn't consider it any 
trouble at all to feed those in the El Paso district, or that 
in McAUen, which baked for the New York division. At 
any one, or all, he would probably become so full of 
facts that he would never after be able to eat a loaf with- 
out a shiver of awe running up and down his spine. 

Captain Bach was quite proud of his outfit in El Paso. 
I found him watching the men removing the steaming 
brown loaves from the three field ovens near Camp Con- 
necticut, at which the Connecticut troops were tented. 

"These are a lot better than the garrison bakery," 
he told me, "because the heat isn't so intense, and they 
can be allowed to cook slower and more evenly. The 
field bread is more compact and has a thicker crust, which 
enables it to be kept much longer, as the moisture is held 
better. Garrison bread will become dry after a short 
time." 

200 



Baking oh the Border tOl 

"How much do you turn out a day? *' I asked. The 
question was simple, but Captain Bach is an enthusiast. 
Statistics poured forth in an avalanche. 

"We make 216 pounds at a baking in each of the 
three ovens," he answered; "that means 108 loaves 
apiece. The field and garrison bakeries together use from 
15,000 to 16,000 pounds of flour a day. In each of the 
ovens there are three chambers, which will hold seventy 
loaves apiece. I've got sixty-one men working for me 
now — a full unit — but when more troops arrive we will 
probably have to enlarge our equipment. 

"Everything is designed with a view to moving at 
an instant's notice, and if we were ordered into Mexico 
this minute we could take the ovens apart and pack the 
whole shooting match in a truck and be on our way. At 
the first stop it would not take us more than an hour to 
have things set up again and baking under way. While 
one detail was at work fixing up the stoves the others 
would have the mixing tent up and prepare the dough. 
I'll show you what the tents are like," he added, with 
pardonable pride. We turned from the sweating bakers 
and entered the tents of khaki and wire screen. 

The first was filled with pans scrupulously clean, 
moulding tables and dough troughs. In each of the lat- 
ter, he said, 150 pounds of flour could be mixed. We 
went into the storage tents where the bread was piled high 
in racks and where, unlike many places about the camps 
not a single fly could be found decorating the landscape. 

We went out into the open once more and watched 
the men toiling away at their tasks. Neither the work of 
the bakers themselves nor of the man in charge is 
easy. If my opinion were asked as to one of the 



202 Along the Rio Grande 

most uncomfortable employments in the land of khaki, 
I would be quite prompt in electing that of breadmaker. 
Many are assigned to the work. The field bakeries at 
McAllen, Pharr and Mission, which provided for 19,000 
New York troops at these places, had nineteen ovens. 
Forty men were at work in the first place, sixteen in the 
second, while Pharr had seventeen. Those who had 
been following the trials of their absent boys on the 
border were almost convinced by this time, I should judge, 
that it was a place where heat is somewhat extreme. At 
Camp Stewart, about seven miles from the heart of El 
Paso, I have seen it 135 degrees in the sun. It is a waste 
of energy to speak of its being a certain temperature in 
the shade, for a person would get heat prostration in his 
anxious attempts to find such a thing. But even under 
the partial shelter of a tent occupied by Captain Deforest 
Chandler of the Signal Corps at Columbus, the officers 
one day were seen interestedly viewing the remains of a 
former thermometer. It was an unsophisticated Northern 
affair brought down by the captain himself, and it only 
provided for the registration of 120 degrees. It struggled 
nobly when the heat became higher, but to no avail. It 
burst. When one adds the warmth of the ovens to the 
normal — or, rather, abnormal — heat of the land which 
v/e once, for some unaccountable reason, took away from 
the Mexicans, it can be seen why the position was one not 
cherished by all. The men, as a rule, took a certain 
pride in their work, which was the one thing that enabled 
them to keep at it with the spirit with which they did. 
Their hours, too, were long. Baking at McAllen for 
the first shift began at two in the morning and continued 
twelve hours for each squad. Other bakeries had largely 



Baking on ike Bordcy *vU3 

the same regulations and conditions which prevailed here, 
with the exception that the hours in some cases were only 
eight hours a day. I should suggest as an excellent cure 
for trainmen who feel that their hours are too long that 
they be given occupation for a time among the breadmen 
of the army, and after the experience there will be a deep 
and lasting content in their midst. 

It is rather natural, when time hangs heavy on the 
hands of a soldier v/ho wishes he were at home, that he 
grumble. He really isn't serious about it, and, in fact, 
derives a certain portion of his entertainment from this 
source, just as weepy females hie them to a tragedy where 
they can enjoy a splendid and gratifying sobfest. It is 
one of the highest compliments that can be paid to the 
work of the big arm.y of bakers, then, that, concerning 
the most important item in their bill of fare, one never 
heard a complaint— but on occasions, instead, could hear 
arising from the clatter of knives and forks a muffled, 
''Say, that's blame good bread." 



CHAPTER XXXII. 
A Soldier of Fortune With Villa. 

Before I arrived at Ysleta I had heard a lot about 
Pancho Villa, but nothing that distinguished him greatly 
from any of the other bandits of dear old Mexico. At 
Ysleta, after a conversation with Dr. Jerome Triolo, a 
soldier of fortune who has served several years in Villa's 
army in a medical capacity with the title of lieutenant- 
colonel, 1 felt that Pancho might be quite an interesting 
person to meet after all. 

Ysleta might be said to have given birth to Villa's 
career, for the father of Dr. Triolo furnished the Mexican 
with nine guns, nine horses and nine everything excepting 
nine men, which Villa supplied himself. Immediately 
thereafter Villa rode across the border into Mexico and 
proceeded to convince a little town called Saragossa that 
he was a person who did not appreciate opposition. 

Recruits rapidly joined him, and it was not long 
before he had a large following and was the temporarily 
pampered pet of the United States. Some years later, 
after spoils had enriched him, he sent back ^30,000 in 
gold to Mr. Triolo as a testimonial of his gratitude for 
help rendered in time of need. 

I talked with Dr. Triolo in the picturesque sitting 
room of the Little Valley Inn of that town. There were 
a number of us gathered about, listening to him, and the 
thrills we received from his stories could only be likened 
to the days when we used to tell ghost stories in a dim 

204 



2 'SolMer of Fortune 205 

and gloomy room, for, since the Columbus affair, Ysleta 
had been constantly expecting a raid from across the 
creek. In the town there are but 300 whites to a popu- 
lation of about 2,000 Mexicans, with only a few troops 
to protect them. Its close proximity to El Paso makes 
it an ideal place for the brown men to attack if a diversion 
was ever created in Juarez to attract the attention of the 
El Paso militia. 

I had been told of some of Dr. Triolo's adventures 
before meeting him, so when I saw an agreeable, mild- 
appearing, medium-sized person in a Palm Beach suit I 
was surprised. He did not in the least fit in with my 
previous conception of a person who valued his life so 
lightly. 

"There were several reasons why Villa was a great 
man," said Dr. Triolo, "but the chief were the fact that 
he was always reliable about paying his men — if he ever 
had money his men got their share and he was an un- 
usually clever strategist. No one could have taken Juarez 
in the manner in which he did without being such. 

"It was commonly believed in the latter part of 
November, 1913, that Villa was on his way to storm 
Chihuahua City. Several miles outside, however, his 
army held up a train which was leaving Juarez for that 
place. He forced the conductor to wire back to the 
Juarez authorities that he was returning, as Villa was 
advancing toward Chihuahua with a large force and he 
feared that the train would be unable to get through. 
After this message had been sent Villa and his merry 
band hopped on the train and rode back into the city of 
Juarez. The inhabitants had prepared no greeting for 
him and were so surprised to see him that they were able 



206 Along the Rio' Grahd^- 

to offer no resistance to his invasion. It surreridei*ed 
almost without a struggle. 

''I was also with him in April, 1913, when he ad- 
vanced on Chihuahua City. Before he entered the town 
he sent several v/omen ahead who pretended they had 
escaped from his clutches. 

'They gained the confidence of the garrison there 
by complaining of the hardships Villa had inflicted upon 
them.. After they had obtained all the necessary informa- 
tion regarding the extent and location of the troops there 
they returned to, their chief. Villa also had an extensive 
spy system. In Chihuahua he had many men who threw 
bombs into the midst of the defenders upon the entrance 
of the Villistas. Even then those in the town thought 
the missiles came from the invaders. 

"Of course. Villa was cruel, but that detracted in 
no way from his generalship, for Villa is no more cruel 
than any of the Mexican people. He thought nothing of 
taking life. At Torreon he lined them up seven deep 
for their execution in order to save ammunition. In 
Juarez one day Villa stopped a peon with a bundle of 
stolen calico under his arm. 

" 'Where did you get that? ' asked Villa. 

" 'I found it on the street,' was the rather flimsy 
answer. Villa turned to a soldier by his side. 

" 'Shoot him,' he said calmly, and walked on. The 
man was shot. 

"On another day in the same town Villa spied a 
rider, wanted for some crime, going down the avenue. 
He pointed him out to a guard with his usual laconic re- 
quest, 'Shoot him.' I doubt if the man ever knew what 
struck him. 



A Soldier of Fortune 207 

**If a person asked a favor of Villa when the latter 
was in a bad mood he was just as apt to be killed as to 
have his favor granted. After executions he was par- 
ticularly morose, and it was an extremely hazardous 
proposition to approach him for two or three days after- 
ward. 

"At Torreon I saw Villa's lieutenant, Fierro, hold 
up a train on which some of the Federalists were attempt- 
ing to leave. A band of horsemen stood on the track in 
front of the train and demanded that the engineer bring 
it to a stop. The engineer was in a rather embarrassing 
position, for standing in back of him with a revolver 
pressed tightly to his head was a Federalist soldier, who 
informed the driver that he would pull the trigger if the 
cars were halted. The engineer paid close heed to him 
until the train passed over one of the horses in the track. 
He put on the brakes and departed for the happy hunting 
grounds. 

"In the same train I saw a bullet pass through the 
head of a child held in its mother's arms and then pene- 
trate the mother's heart. 

"In the last car was a Federalist band, seven or eight 
of whom had already been killed in the fight. After the 
train had been stopped Villa dragged them all out. He 
wanted music and commanded them to play. All but 
one of them did so. He seemed to feel that it was an 
imposition to be asked to perform after so many of his 
comrades had died. His fate was the usual one. 

"A Mexican understands and respects force of this 
sort, however, and it was probably largely due to this 
that they followed him so devotedly. 

"There were other characteristics of Villa's how- 



208 Along the Rio Grande 

ever, that compelled this following. He was always 
square and generous with them. Whenever he had money 
they were always sure of their pay. He never allowed 
them to do any looting of their own free will — it was 
an inviolable rule of his that it must be under his direc- 
tion — but the spoils were great and their pay good. 
Villa is a total abstainer, he neither smokes nor drinks — 
the only way in which he could be caught at a disadvan- 
tage was through the fact that he could neither read nor 
write, although he has since learned. 

"His men would undergo any hardship for him with- 
out complaining, and I never saw one of them show the 
yellow streak — a characteristic which I think will surprise 
the American troops if the occasion arises for them to go 
into Mexico, which doubtless will be the case within the 
next six months. 

"At the battle of Torreon I superintended the trans- 
ference of five carloads of wounded from that city to 
Chihuahua City, where they could be cared for in the 
five hospitals of that city. They were jarred and jammed 
about in the freight cars for forty-eight hours, and the 
only nourishment they had was a tortilla and a bottle of 
milk apiece, yet there wasn't the slightest suggestion of 
complaint on the part of the men. 

"When they arrived at Chihuahua City those who 
were able to sit up were piled into the street cars, while 
the rest were carried to the hospital. Everywhere I saw 
the same evidences of courage and hardihood. I remem- 
ber one man who was shot through an arm and both 
legs. A bomb had exploded in his face and his head was 
twice its natural size. The first thing he did, however, 
when he got in the car was to ask for a cigarette, and in 



A Soldier of Fortune, 209 

a minute I saw him blandly smiling, with it in the least 
swollen part of his mouth." 

"Didn't you ever have any fear of personal danger 
from Villa?" I asked. 

"Not from him," responded the doctor. "He was 
always very friendly to Americans, particularly after Gen- 
eral Scott, through instructions from Washington, led 
him to believe the United States would recognize him 
when the time came. Of course his attitude changed 
to one of bitterness after the support of our Government 
was withdrawn, but in spite of everything, I only came 
near losing my life on two occasions. 

"Once while riding ahead of an ambulance wagon 
— one of the few Villa's army had, for the usual Mexican 
custom is to shoot those who are badly wounded — a bul- 
let passed through my leg and killed my horse beneath me. 

"The other time was when I went down to a city 
called Sinaloa to take my wife and child who were there 
back with me to Tierra Blanca. When I arrived a man 
was put in jail for a mining fraud. He conceived the 
idea that it was I who had been responsible for his im- 
prisonment. In order to avenge himself he told General 
Obregon I was a Villa spy, and the General clapped me 
into jail. I was condemned to be shot. I stayed in prison 
for fourteen days awaiting execution. Fortunately, how- 
ever, before the day arrived my brother, who knew Car- 
ranza very well, got word to him of my plight, and 
through him I was released. 

"Even then my troubles were not over, for I had 
great difficulty in escaping from the town. I had to 
disguise myself as a woman, and my wife and I, with 
an Indian carrying our child in a box on his back, had 



210 Along the Rio Grande 

.1 walk four days over the mountains through snow up 
to our waists at times before we were able to reach Tierra 
Blanca, where I left her to rejoin Villa's army. 

"Villa no longer possesses the power that he used 
to, but the United States, after its blunder in not recog- 
nizing Huerta, could still have brought about order in 
Mexico by placing Villa in power, for he is the one man 
who possesses sufficient military genius and the ability to 
control his people and make Mexico a safe place for 
Americans. Under him Juarez was never so well policed 
or so safe for white people before or since." 

The guests began to file in from the porch. Dr. 
Triolo arose to leave. A few minutes afterward we were 
all in our beds dreaming of raids on Ysleta, in which 
Pancho Villa played a conspicuous and terrifying part, 
for in spite of what we had heard about his good qualities, 
the stories of his cruelty had made the greatest im- 
pression. 



CHAPTER XXXIIL 
The Mexican Anny. 

Mexico's army is the busiest thing in a land where 
business has almost ceased; it is the funniest thing in a 
land brimming with misery; it is the most constant thing 
in a land where each day sees some new revulsion. 

It is the tragedy of the nation, as well as its hope; 
the first because of the purposes for which it is used, 
revolution after revolution, and the latter because under 
the leadership of the right man and with the proper 
training it contains the material with which to drag the 
country out of the quicksands of disorder into which it 
has fallen. 

The great mass of fighting men come from the 
peon class. It is the one method left to put food into 
a stomach that otherwise knows none. It usually takes 
little persuasion to induce them to adopt a military life, 
for incessant taxation has left them little chance to exist 
if they turn their attention to agriculture instead. But 
if persuasion is needed Mexican leaders are not hesitant 
about employing it. It is not always of the gentlest 
sort. "Pressing" men into service is one of the best 
things the Mexican Government does. Occasionally it 
is given the color of legality. Huerta when he needed 
more men passed a law that all Mexicans appearing in 
the streets wearing trousers which resembled the lower 
part of a pair of pajamas — almost a universal form of 
attire for the males in some sections of the country — 

211 



£12 Along the Rio Grande 

should be arrested for breach of public morals and be 
required to serve as soldiers as punishment. Not much 
publicity was given to the statute, so fathers were soon 
being separated from their families by the wholesale. 

Not always does the Government go to the trouble 
of passing special laws such as this. Recruiting officers 
in times of necessity proceed up the streets to take whom- 
soever they find. A few words in Spanish, the equiva- 
lent of "Tag, you're it," are almost the sole explanation 
they receive, and the peons are forced into the service, 
usually without another opportunity to see again the 
families which they are, in the majority of cases, leaving 
forever. 

It is not surprising, in view of such stringent con- 
scription, that the soldiers are quite prone to desert when 
the opportunity is given them. After the evacuation 
of Torreon by the Federals under the Huerta regime 
General Munguia was summoned before the court-martial 
to show cause why he should not be shot for inefficiency. 
*'I was unable to meet the enemy,*' he said in explana- 
tion, "for they fight in loose formation and I was obliged 
to keep mine in close order. Otherwise they would all 
have deserted. I was also unable to command the offi- 
cers to lead them in charge, for they would not have 
hesitated to shoot their leaders the instant the • orders 
were given." 

There is little organization in the army, for efficient 
officers are scarce. It would be difficult to find the time 
to train them even were they capable of doing so. The 
average Mexican's idea of a fight is that victory goes 
to the side making the greatest amount of noise by lung 
power and burning of gunpowder. As far as they are 



The Mexican Army. 218 

i 

I concerned, the art of pursuit is a dead one. Given a 
. fair opportunity, two opposing forces on glimpsing one 
' another will turn and ride in opposite directions until 
they believe a safe distance separates them. Of course, 
if battle is unavoidable, they will fight, and no one on 
such occasions can accuse them of lack of bravery. 
Their effectiveness is somewhat hampered, however, by 
their custom of discharging their pieces into the air from 
the hip. It makes a lot of noise, but higher praise one 
cannot give it. 

I was told of a battle which took place in the north- 
ern part of Sonora between some Villa forces and the 
Federalists. All day shots were exchanged between the 
two across a valley. The uproar was terrific, but the 
execution small.' The casualties totalled one gray mule. 
Another battle raged for four hours near a mine 
in Monterey. One of the employees there who described 
it to me told how the bullets rained like hail through the 
tops of the trees— so thick that hundreds of blackbirds 
were afterward found lifeless, and great flocks of them, 
bewildered and terrified, took refuge on the ground. But 
''the dickey birds,'' as he called them, were the greatest 
sufferers and few soldiers were the victims of their ene- 
mies' bullets. 

One finds in the army everything from boys of 
fourteen to men of sixty. They are soldiers as soon as 
they are provided with a rifle, cartridge belts and a uni- 
form, although in many cases the latter has not been 
furnished them. But no matter what their age they 
possess their merits as fighting men as well as their faults, 
and more attention is usually paid to the latter than the 
former. Hardships they have experienced all their lives, 



814 Along the Rio Grande ■ . .. 

so when they encounter them in warfare they do so with 
fortitude. They complain but little and can travel amaz- 
ing distances on an amount of food that would not last 
Americans for a tenth of the time, and even then 
cause them to write North letters of the enormous trials 
they were enduring. Their menu is not complicated. 
It consists of tortillas (a form of pancakes), frijoles, 
which are red Mexican beans, enchiladas (a concoction 
filled with spice, chopped meat and other ingredients), 
with occasionally meat furnished by any unfortunate 
cattle upon which they have chanced. A large number 
of femmes des guerres accompany them. They serve the 
double capacity of wife and cook. 

A man who travelled out of Mexico to the border 
in 1913 with General Obregon's men described to me 
the conditions on the march. 

'The women," he said, "conduct a sort of *fonda,' 
or kitchen, and get paid for the stuff they cook. Some 
of them are certainly a funny looking sight. I remember 
one clad in a single piece slip — nothing else — with two 
cartridge belts crossed over her breast and carrying a 
child in her arms. There was another kid by her side 
and a third riding on top of the burden supported by her 
mule. She was bare-footed and carried a load of about 
ninety pounds on her back, but the crowning glory of 
the effect was a rooster which rode perched on the crown 
of a wide straw hat which she wore. 

''As soon as the march for the day ceases they 
begin the preparation of the meal. If cattle are possessed 
they are killed and the flesh placed, still quivering, on 
the coals. After this the tortillas are made ready. I 
watched the process and for the first few days I ate 



The Mexican Army. 215 

nothing. Their hands, apparently, are never washed. 
Occasionally, after they have become too greasy from 
much patting into shape of the cakes, the women wipe 
them on their aprons. This has been done so often that 
a deep crust of dirt and grease is the result. My appetite 
suffered. However, when I could stand my hunger no 
longer I waited until all the others had been served, for 
I figured that after kneading many tortillas her hands 
would be somewhat cleaner. 

"During the meal the general remarked, 'Do you 
remember the march from Chihuahua, Marie? ' I learned 
afterward that he referred to an incident connected with 
the birth of a child of hers. During the journey of the 
army she dropped out. An hour later she had again 
overtaken the troops and was carrying a newly born 
baby. This is not unusual, and the army never pauses 
to av/ait the arrival of such additions to their numbers. 
When conscription is needed to fill up the ranks of the 
army many women are impressed at the same time, for 
they are quite as essential a part of the equipment as fire- 
arms." 

Over the American army, however, if it ever in- 
vades Mexico, the native troops will possess one great 
advantage. They know their country perfectly and are 
natural guerrilla fighters. When once they take refuge 
in the hills they will not be dislodged again without great 
loss of life, and many of the men who go in scorning them 
will come out again with a heightened respect — \i they 
come out at all. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




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